


The Right Reasons

by BeginToFray



Series: (Issues) We've got the kind of love it takes to solve them. [9]
Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-17
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-10-11 21:37:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 34,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17454749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeginToFray/pseuds/BeginToFray
Summary: This story is set a few years after All But One. Eve and Villanelle are still happily together but there's something on Villanelle's mind, and it's not going away...





	1. Five Years

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, I thought I was done with this series too, and yet... here I am with another instalment. You can thank BingeTheGay for this one. And that's who it is dedicated to. I was asked a simple question, and this is what happened... It was meant to be one chapter. 
> 
> Give me your thoughts, they fuel me!

It was early evening and Eve had set up camp at the kitchen table under the guise of going through some paperwork whilst Villanelle prepared dinner for the both of them.

“Thank-you for bringing in my lunch earlier by the way, darling.” Eve directed at Villanelle’s back as the other woman was slicing an onion at the kitchen counter.  
  
“I have seen what they make in that canteen,” Villanelle replied knowingly. “You should not eat that shit.”  
  
Eve was inclined to agree. With the amount of money at the disposal of MI6, one might assume that the food in the canteen would be decent at least. But no, the culinary delights on offer were always some unidentifiable mess in varying shades of beige. Villanelle had come tearing into Eve’s office one day when she had been visiting and demanded to know whether Eve ever ate in the canteen. Eve had rarely done so before that point, and had never done so since. Villanelle made sure of that.

Every now and then Eve worried that she had somehow managed to turn someone who was once a fearsome and ruthless assassin into a domesticated housewife who thrived on prepping vegetables and marinating meat. But then Villanelle would do something absurdly, well, _Villanelle_ and Eve would heave a sigh of relief. Just the other day Eve had arrived home to discover Villanelle hacking savagely at a butternut squash with a switchblade. Villanelle had claimed it was a ‘work-related experiment’ but Eve had suspected it was a purely recreational squash slaughter. Either way, the resulting soup was divine.   
  
These days Villanelle’s job with MI6 consisted mostly of assessing grisly crime scenes – either remotely via vomit-inducing photographs or on location – and deciding whether or not the murders were the work of an assassin and if so, who was likely to have orchestrated them. Villanelle could tell the experience of a killer from the kill itself. She recognised instantly the tastes and the traits of various known individuals, and was familiar with modus operandi of the organisations behind them. Villanelle, or Sophie Wilson as she was known professionally, was a valuable asset for British Intelligence, still not safe to have around the office, but a priceless addition to the service. One thing had changed though, Villanelle no longer worked directly for Carolyn Martens. Another cause of relief for Eve.  
  
“Did you know that Tony on the security desk is getting married?” Villanelle enquired, glancing briefly over her shoulder at Eve.  
  
“I… uh. No.” Eve replied in a tone of mild surprise at Villanelle’s offering up of that particular shred of information, “I didn’t know that.”  
  
“Mmmhmm.” Villanelle hummed. “He has been with Karen for three years.” She added conversationally  
  
Eve crumpled her eyebrows in confusion.  
  
“I didn’t know you and Tony were so close.” Eve said, bemused.  
  
“I taught him a strangle hold that puts people to sleep.” Villanelle said proudly.   
  
“Oh God.” Eve groaned. “I don’t think he needs to know that.”  
  
“He is a security guard!” Villanelle insisted, turning to look at Eve and leaning back against the counter, a kitchen knife still clasped in her hand.   
  
“Still…” Eve said quietly.  
  
“He doesn’t even have a gun.” Villanelle said her eyes wide in disbelief. “Can you believe?” she added.  
  
“Well yes, in England they don’t really do that—” Eve started.  
  
“We have been together for five years.” Villanelle interrupted, nodding at Eve pointedly and gesturing between the two of them loosely with the knife.  
  
Eve took a moment to catch up with the abrupt change in conversation.  
  
“Have we?” Eve asked, attempting to do the calculation in her head.   
  
“Yes.” Villanelle said decisively.   
  
Eve narrowed her eyes at Villanelle.  
  
“No.” Eve said, dragging the word out cautiously. “That can’t be right. My divorce was only final three years ago.”  
  
“We have been together for five years.” Villanelle repeated flatly, twirling the kitchen knife expertly in her hand.  
  
Not so long ago, Eve would have kept half an eye on that knife as it flashed and reflected the overhead spotlight on its glinting metal. Not now though. Now Eve was barely aware of the potential weapon in her partner’s grip. Perhaps those wary days were further back than Eve realised. Perhaps it had been five years since Eve last feared for her life. According to Villanelle, it had been. That couldn’t be right though…  
  
“Wait.” Eve said, raising a hand, “When are you counting from exactly?” she asked curiously.  
  
“When Konstantin said, ‘There is a woman looking for you. Her name is Eve Polastri,’ or something like that.” Villanelle replied off-hand, filling in Konstantin’s part with a deep, gruff voice complete with thick accent. It was a good impression. Villanelle had always retained the ability to shift out of herself and into someone else at will.  
  
“That is not when we got together!” Eve exclaimed.  
  
“It will do.” Villanelle shrugged.   
  
“What? No.” Eve disagreed. “That’s ridiculous. We weren’t together then at all.”  
  
“We basically were.” Villanelle muttered.   
  
“No, Oksana. I was trying to get you arrested and you were killing and fucking your way across Europe. We were not together then.” Eve said, shaking her head ruefully.  
  
“Whatever. You wanted me.” Villanelle grumbled and Eve’s mouth dropped open in offence as she began to formulate a retort to point out that Villanelle had wanted _her_ just as much.  
  
“When do you count from then?” Villanelle asked petulantly before Eve had a chance to reply, “From when I first fucked you?” She suggested, “That is not very romantic, Eve.” She finished with an arched brow and a disapproving tutting sound.   
  
“No,” Eve replied, elongating the word once more, “And if you’ll remember correctly, _I_ fucked _you_ first.” Eve added smugly. To this day, she was genuinely proud of herself for that.  
  
Villanelle cocked her head to one side in acceptance as if she had actually forgotten how their first time had played out. She hadn’t forgotten at all, of course.   
  
“Yes. That was surprising.” Villanelle agreed and Eve frowned in mild affront.   
  
“I think we should count it from when you moved in. Which, by the way, I never asked you to do.” Eve pointed out with a teasing glare.  
  
Villanelle considered that for a moment.  
  
“I knew you wanted me here.” Villanelle replied dismissively.  
  
“I thought you were here to kill me.” Eve retorted with a huff. Villanelle scoffed and rolled her eyes.  
  
“Oh, sure. And you were _so_ scared that _you_ fucked _me_ first.” She said deliberately.   
  
Villanelle kind of had a point there though, Eve realised. Looking back, she couldn’t have been that terrified of the younger woman if she was so willing to sleep with her. It had felt different at the time though. Eve had no comeback to Villanelle’s remark.   
  
“Anyway, whatever, it is more than three years.” Villanelle said with finality, spinning back around to the chopping board and her momentarily forgotten onion.  
  
“What has that got to do with anything?” Eve asked, beginning to pile up her untouched paperwork.  
  
“Tony and Karen have been together for three years.” Villanelle replied, “I checked.”   
  
“And?” Eve asked, sliding her papers back into a folder. She was not following Villanelle’s thought process at all here.   
  
“ _And_ they are getting married.” Villanelle said carefully, keeping her back to Eve, but pausing in her slicing of the onion.   
  
Oh. Understanding hit Eve like a sledgehammer. Now she was on the same page. Jesus. How was she meant to navigate this one? Elena had warned her this would come up at some point, but Eve had laughed her off. Her relationship with Villanelle had been unorthodox from the start. Marriage just wasn’t on the cards for them. Villanelle would never want that. It would be far too… normal. Besides, Eve had been married before and that had been, by the end, boring. Villanelle would never be satisfied by marriage, it would make her feel trapped. For God’s sake, if it rained for too long Villanelle began to pace like a caged tiger. Villanelle did not like rain. They had experienced a particularly wet April month and Eve wouldn’t have been surprised if she had come home to find Villanelle had clawed the sofa to shreds. Actually, she had come home to find Villanelle had rearranged their bedroom in a fit of stir-crazy interior designing.  
  
Eve was thrown by this not-so-subtle hint from Villanelle.  
  
“Oksana, I don’t…” Eve started with trepidation rife in her voice. Her sentence fell off a cliff, but it hung mid-air for an uneasy moment before plummeting into silence as Eve tried desperately to gather her thoughts.  
  
“Do you want a glass of wine?” Villanelle asked Eve abruptly after the silence had spread to fill every nook and cranny of the room.   
  
Eve was left behind once more in the conversation. Villanelle had always had a habit of doing this to Eve. Just when Eve thought she knew what they were talking about Villanelle would bound onto a different topic entirely. They would be merrily discussing a case from work and Villanelle would steer them directly into a conversational ditch by suggesting they try some new sex thing that Eve had never heard of. Normally, this rollercoaster of discussion was the result of Villanelle’s rapid thought processes. This time though, that leap away from a potentially important topic had felt very deliberate. Villanelle had turned down a dark alley and now she was furiously trying to back out of it.  
  
“Oh. Yes please, darling.” Eve replied slowly. “But we should talk about—”  
  
“Red or white?” Villanelle asked, unnecessarily loud and effectively cutting Eve’s sentence down in its tracks.   
  
Eve let out a breath slowly; she hadn’t noticed that she was holding it. Actually, her whole body felt tensed all of a sudden, taut and uncomfortable.   
  
“Red.” Eve muttered, “Red, please.”   
  
“OK!” Villanelle let out with what sounded like almost forced happiness. She grabbed a wine bottle from beside her and reached into a cupboard for glasses while Eve watched her silently from the table.  
  
  
  
  
A couple of days later and Villanelle flicked a pen back and forth between her fingers. She twisted the rotating office chair that she was perched on to one side and then the other as she listened to the repeated ringing tone in the phone she held to her ear. She was in the room that used to be considered Eve’s home office but had long since been taken over by Villanelle herself, though _technically_ they shared the space. Eve’s books remained on the shelves, but Villanelle’s favourite crime scene photos adorned the pin board behind the desk. Eve could have kicked herself when she realised that these photos were not of the scenes that Villanelle had been tasked with analysing. No, these scenes were familiar to Eve as well; they were Villanelle’s own crime scenes. Eve really should have noticed sooner than she had. She had agonised over those photos for months, wishing she could be absorbed by them and, in turn, learn to understand the woman who committed those brutal acts. Villanelle had found the photos on Eve’s hard drive and printed them on glossy paper.   
  
“You really want to work surrounded by pictures of the people you murdered?” Eve had queried, nonplussed, when the penny finally dropped and she recognised a well-known pair of glassy eyes staring out from a spot next to a brightly coloured ‘Save The Date’ card on the pin board. Villanelle had simply shrugged.  
  
“You have never been proud of your work?” She asked, as though she had simply pinned up an ‘Employee of the Month’ certificate, as opposed to gory photos of people she had assassinated.

Once again, in a slightly warped way, Villanelle’s point had been fair and Eve had allowed the photos to remain. She could hardly claim to be squeamish at this point. 

At last, there came the click of connection on the other end of the phone that Villanelle had been impatiently waiting for. She didn’t wait for an answering voice.  
  
“Finally!” Villanelle exclaimed, sitting up straighter in the chair, “What were you doing? Taking a shit or something?” She asked accusingly.   
  
“Hello Villanelle.” Came a voice, but not the voice that Villanelle had been expecting. Or necessarily wanting.  
  
“Oh great. It is you.” Villanelle muttered. “Where is your dad?”  
  
“How is school, Irina? You should come and visit soon.” The voice replied mockingly.   
  
“Fuck off. Put your dad on the phone.” Villanelle replied, ignoring Irina’s comments.   
  
“It is ‘fuck off’ now? You don’t tell me to shut up anymore? You know, you really shouldn’t swear at children.” Irina said knowledgeably.  
  
“You are old enough to be told to fuck off now. So fuck off. And put your dad on the phone.” Villanelle said, becoming bored of this exchange.  
  
“That is a very rude word still.” Irina chastised.  
  
“It is not the rudest word.” Villanelle rebuked, and then continued, “I could have called you a little cu—”  
  
“PAPA!!” Irina’s voice belted out immediately.  
  
Villanelle smirked victoriously and pulled the receiver away from her ear as Irina bellowed for her father. There was a muffled reply on the other end of the phone and then Villanelle could make out the noise of heavy, plodding, footsteps.  
  
“He is coming now,” Irina said, directing her voice into the phone once more, “Say hi to your girlfriend for me.” she added, her tone a good-natured taunt.  
  
“Say hi to your massive mother for me.” Villanelle replied in the same tone.  
  
There was the sound of the phone changing hands and a murmured conversation echoed down the line from thousands of miles away before another voice took over with a grunt.  
  
“Villanelle?”  
  
“Yes. Hello Konstantin.” Villanelle replied politely.

She felt a wave of warmth at the sound of this voice, but she didn’t allow it to leak into her own. There was a pause that stretched on a beat too long until Villanelle cleared her throat.  
  
“How is Russia?” She enquired.  
  
“Shitty.” He grunted. “How is London?”  
  
“It rains. A lot.” Villanelle replied.   
  
There was another pause, it lingered and became awkward. Villanelle found herself at a loss for words. She had called for a reason, she had wanted to hear Konstantin’s voice, hear this thoughts, but now she felt silly, embarrassed. It had been urgent when she picked up the phone and dialled the area code for Russia. Now, with the reality of crackling static on the phone line, she was sure Konstantin would laugh at her if she voiced her concerns. Villanelle could hear Konstantin shifting on the other end of the line. She could picture his hulking form, his rounded shoulders, and the phone dwarfed in his large hand.  
  
“Did you call for a reason, Villanelle?” Konstantin asked suspiciously, “Or would you like to discuss the weather further?”  
  
Villanelle took a deep breath. Perhaps she could come up with an excuse. She could say she was simply wondering how he was. No. He would be able to sniff out that bullshit from across the entire continent. Maybe she could ask something about work or—

“How long was it until you married your fat wife?” Villanelle garbled out her question before she realised she had made a decision.   
  
“How long from what?” Konstantin replied, his confusion clear.  
  
“From when you met her.” Villanelle confirmed.  
  
“Not long. I got her pregnant.” Konstantin chuckled.  
  
“Oh.” Villanelle replied, disappointed. “That is not helpful at all,” she added, “OK. Well, Bye!”  
  
“A-ah! Stay on the phone.” Came Konstantin’s order. Villanelle’s shoulders slumped. This phone call had been a big mistake.   
  
“Why do you ask this?” Konstantin said. There was a knowing tone to his voice, it was laced with amusement. He knew. Villanelle felt heat creep into her cheeks.  
  
“I was just making conversation?” She tried. It was a futile diversion attempt and she knew it.  
  
“Villanelle…” Konstantin warned.   
  
“Ugh. Fine!” Villanelle exclaimed. “I think Eve and me should get married.”  
  
Villanelle had to pull the phone from her ear for a second time as Konstantin’s hearty laughter bounced off her eardrum. It took a while for his laughs to lessen and turn into wheezy gasps. Meanwhile Villanelle waited, a thunderous look on her face.  
  
“Oh!” Konstantin exclaimed, still snickering, “Oh, it is good to laugh,” he added. His eyes were creased with laughter and letting out tears that he wiped away with the back of his hand.  
  
Villanelle said nothing.   
  
“Villanelle? Are you there?” Konstantin asked, eventually noticing the silence on the phone line.   
  
“Yes.” She growled.   
  
“I am sorry.” Konstantin said, he aimed for sincerity but Villanelle could hear the smile in his voice and her scowl darkened still further. “Continue. You think you and Eve should get married. Why?”  
  
“Because we have been together five years.” Villanelle said simply. She knew Eve disputed that number but Villanelle had thought of nobody but Eve for five years. If that didn’t constitute a commitment then she didn’t know what did.  
  
“That is it? That is the reason?” Konstantin questioned.  
  
“What else?” Villanelle replied at once, defensively.  
  
There was more. Of course there was. But Konstantin had made her feel foolish and Villanelle wasn’t about to share anything else with him now.   
  
“What does Eve say?” Konstantin asked.  
  
“I don’t know.” Villanelle shrugged for nobody’s benefit but her own.  
  
“You didn’t ask her?” Konstantin replied, surprised.   
  
“No.” Villanelle stated firmly.   
  
“Why?”   
  
Villanelle had tested the waters a couple of nights ago. She had laid a trail of breadcrumbs in her detailing the security guy’s upcoming nuptials, and Eve had blundered past them all. Clearly marriage was not as prevalent in Eve’s mind. And her voice when she had finally figured it out, well, it didn’t sound overjoyed. That tone of trepidation had sunk like a stone in Villanelle.  
  
“What if she says no?” Villanelle asked quietly.   
  
There was vulnerability in her voice and she hated it. She felt exposed. What if Eve did say no? What would that mean? That she didn’t love her enough to marry her?   
  
“What if she says yes?” Konstantin countered.   
  
“You think she would?” Villanelle replied hopefully.   
  
“Perhaps. Perhaps not. How should I know? You should talk to Irina, she is good with this sort of shit.” Konstantin suggested as though he had just come up with a master plan.  
  
“No.” Villanelle replied, frowning. “No way. _I_ am good with this sort of shit.” She added haughtily.   
  
“So good at it that you are calling me.” Konstantin said, not bothering to say it under his breath.  
  
“Whatever.” Villanelle said flippantly.  
  
Konstantin heaved a frustrated sigh.  
  
“If you want to do it then you have to ask her.” He let out exasperatedly.  
  
Villanelle rolled her eyes. She hadn’t called her old mentor for him to state the obvious to her. She had hoped for advice, preferably helpful advice.   
  
“I had not thought of that.” Villanelle said sarcastically, “Thank-you for your very wise words.”  
  
“Don’t be cheeky.” Konstantin replied, a sudden seriousness in his tone. And Villanelle could practically see him shaking a thick finger at her.   
  
“Just ask her nicely. But do not do it for the wrong reasons.” He said warningly.   
  
Villanelle thought over her reasons again. They were not the wrong ones.   
  
“OK.” She agreed, nodding and preparing to hang up.  
  
“And Villanelle?” Konstantin let out, before she had a chance to end the call.  
  
“What?” Villanelle asked agitated at his prolonging this conversation.  
  
“You did not get her pregnant did you?” Konstantin asked, barely able to finish the sentence before breaking out into rasping laughter once more.  
  
Villanelle growled indignantly and hung up the phone whilst she could still hear Konstantin’s bubbling sounds of amusement at his own joke bouncing down the line.


	2. Finish You Off

Normally Villanelle was a good sleeper. She had a clean conscience and a comfy bed, the woman she loved was invariably secured in her arms and more often than not she went to sleep satisfied. There were times when she was away for work and then her sleep was less restorative, then she succumbed to it with a shallower, self-applied satisfaction and her arms felt vacant. But for the last few nights, even in the warm cocoon of her own bed, Villanelle had not been sleeping well.

The idea had been prowling her mind before she encountered Tony the security guy and his happy news. Villanelle was aware that her relationship with Eve was stable and secure in all but legal name. She was aware that it shouldn’t matter, that it shouldn’t change anything. They wouldn’t be more likely to stay together because they had both signed a piece of paper. After all, Eve had signed a piece of paper before and look at her now, shacked up with a blonde Russian little more than half her age. If that wasn’t a classic marriage story, then what was? But Villanelle wanted it. She wanted the world to know that she was Eve’s. She wanted them bound together because that is the way she feels they really exist.

There was a part of her, yes, a small part, that has grown smaller still over the years, that is pained that Eve wilfully married the moustache man, but has never even circulated the idea of a similar union with Villanelle. The glowing embers of that jealousy used to singe the pit of her stomach from time-to-time. Now, for the most part, unless a sudden breeze stirred it back into sparks of life, that fire was blackened ash and no longer a cause for concern. Villanelle’s desire to marry Eve was not related to jealousy, or a desire for a sense of possession. It was not a need to keep Eve in her grasp; it was a need to be kept, a need to know that somebody wanted to keep her. In fact, it probably wasn’t Villanelle’s desire at all; this dream was Oksana’s. For that little girl, the idea of security was pure mythology. If Eve married Villanelle, it meant, without doubt, that she wanted her. And _that_ , that is what Villanelle needed more than anything else.

But if Eve didn’t want it, if she didn’t want to marry Villanelle, then… Well. That thought jabbed at Villanelle viciously, the fear of that being the case… It made it difficult to ask.

The illuminated clock beside the bed told Villanelle it was two thirty-eight in the morning. Beside her, Eve rolled towards Villanelle and heaved a sigh in sleep, nestling her face deeper into her pillow and curling in on herself until her shin was in contact with the side of Villanelle’s thigh. Eve settled once more and her breathing evened out. Villanelle studied Eve in the dark. She wondered what last name Eve would take if they were to get married. Would Eve want to change her name? Would she want Villanelle to do it? Villanelle would happily do it; she had been changing her name all her life. Eve had remained Eve Polastri even beyond her divorce for simplicity’s sake. They’d had a brief argument about it at the time, back when the jealousy in Villanelle still burnt fiercely when stoked. Eve had stood her ground though. She didn’t want to change all her documents all over again. Polastri was just easier. It didn’t mean anything. And Villanelle had been forced to accept defeat.

“What would you be called?” Villanelle whispered, thinking aloud to herself in the still darkness of the bedroom. She stroked a curious finger down the length of Eve’s nose, barely making contact. Eve’s nose twitched.

“Eve Astankova?” Villanelle tried, gently tapping the very end of Eve’s nose a couple of times.

“What?” Eve murmured, scrunching her eyes up and rubbing her face against her pillow before opening her eyes and blinking blearily at Villanelle.

Villanelle retracted her hand at once and shoved it back under the covers, her heart pounded at the sudden disturbance of her musings and the fear that Eve had heard her words.

“What?” Villanelle parroted back at Eve, feigning confusion.

“You said something?” Eve asked, her voice thick with sleep.

“No. Go back to sleep baby.” Villanelle soothed, “Come here.”

Villanelle lifted her arm for Eve who shuffled closer and slipped beneath it, saying no more. Villanelle placed a kiss to Eve’s hairline and listened as Eve sank into sleep once more.

Villanelle’s heart rate eased. Probably not Astankova, she decided.

 

“She said what?” Elena laughed, dropping her croissant back onto her plate and staring at Eve, open mouthed.

Eve had fired off an emergency WhatsApp to Elena early in the morning, demanding a pre-work coffee to discuss Eve’s growing worries about Villanelle’s weirder-than-usual behaviour. They were seated in their customary café around the corner from work with twenty minutes to spare before either of them would be expected to be at their desks.

“I don’t know,” Eve groaned, lowering her head into her hands and tugging at her own hair, her elbows plonked on the table, “Maybe she didn’t say it. I mean, I was half asleep, I could have misheard?”

“Eve Astankova?” Elena repeated Eve’s earlier words. “It doesn’t really sound like anything else though, does it? It’s not like she might have said, ‘Fancy a quick fuck at lunch tomorrow?’ and you heard, ‘Eve Astankova,’ is it?”

“I know. I know.” Eve moaned at the table, then lifted her head, her hair wild from where her fingers had raked through it, “What am I going to do?”

“You could try marrying her.” Elena suggested lightly, retrieving her croissant and smiling around a bite of it.

Eve cocked her head and glared at Elena unimpressed.

“She would hate being married. I think I hated being married, I just didn’t notice it at the time.” Eve explained.

“Maybe you just hated being married to Niko.” Elena suggested through a mouthful of croissant. “He was a bit… Vanilla. And clearly you like your partners a bit more… Vodka?” Elena waggled her eyebrows a couple of times suggestively.

“We don’t need to get married!” Eve almost shouted, ignoring Elena’s comment.

“Of course you don’t.” Elena placated, “But I told you this would happen.” She added, averting her eyes.

“Well, obviously you know everything then. What should I do?” Eve demanded.

“Would it be so bad?” Elena shrugged and Eve sighed loudly.

“She’s young. Marriage puts a lot of pressure on a relationship.” Eve said, her voice tired and strained.

“No offence, but that’s a bit patronising, babe. She is thirty now. Same age as me actually. Am I too young to know what I want?” Elena asked accusingly.

“No! Of course not!” Eve exclaimed and then her shoulders slumped once more, “She probably just wants a party anyway, you know, a wedding, not a marriage.”

Elena looked sceptical.

“I don’t know, babe. She really loves you.” Elena said thoughtfully.

“She also really loves parties. Remember my fiftieth?” Eve asked, casting her mind back to the time when she had finally given in to Villanelle’s desire to throw her a party to celebrate her milestone birthday.

It had been the most outrageously lavish and over-the-top affair Eve had ever attended. Her wider circle of friends had been utterly baffled by it until they were all too drunk to question it anymore.

“Barely, to be honest.” Elena murmured with a shudder. Sometimes she felt like she was still hung over from that night.

“I just don’t want her to feel trapped by it.” Eve sighed.

“I get that.” Elena said sympathetically.

“And I don’t feel like we need it.” Eve said, a bit more forcefully.

“Maybe she does though?” Elena urged.

Eve considered Elena’s suggestion. There could be something in it. Villanelle did have a yearning to belong, to be accepted, even if she hid it well from most people. Perhaps that is what she thought marriage was. Eve felt herself softening slightly at that thought.

“You know, you’re supposed to be on my side.” Eve accused though there was no bite in her words.

Elena held up her hands in defence.

“Hey, I like you both! I mean, Villanelle is a crazy bitch but she cracks me up. I can be on your side and not think this is the worst idea in the world.” Elena reasoned with a smile.

Eve simply blinked at Elena a few times and took a sip of her coffee.

“She hasn’t even brought it up anyway, not properly. Just play it by ear and then talk to her about it.” Elena concluded, popping the last bite of croissant into her mouth.

“Traitor.” Eve muttered into her coffee cup.

“Reckon she’d wear a dress or a suit?” Elena wondered aloud, not looking at Eve, but staring into the middle distance before shrugging, “She’d look hot in either.”

“Elena!” Eve scolded. “Not helpful.” She added before considering Elena’s words a bit more closely. “True though.”

“Right?” Elena laughed

 

The subject of marriage had stayed below the surface for another couple of days after Villanelle’s night-time name game before rearing its head once more, and doing so at a particularly inopportune time as far as Eve was concerned.

Eve could feel the familiar sheen of sweat at her hairline, misting her forehead, as her body heated up, its tension coiled and ready almost for release. But whilst her body was almost ready, Eve was not. She wanted to relish the feeling of Villanelle’s attentions on her a bit longer. She had thought that perhaps over time, Villanelle would lose some small amount of interest in this aspect of their relationship. She had thought the so-called honeymoon period would wear off. But Villanelle’s vigour had never shown any signs of abating and now that Eve thought about it, her own desire for the other woman hadn’t decreased either. Maybe the lack of sex between herself and Niko wasn’t just the normal marital decay as she had always assumed. Or maybe it was exactly that. Maybe if they had never married then they would have been fine. Eve almost scoffed at that thought but stopped herself just in time; it would probably have put Villanelle off.

And God. Villanelle hadn’t been kidding all those years ago when she told Eve she knew what she was doing, and she still did. Eve could feel herself edging ever closer towards the precipice under Villanelle’s ministrations. Eve was trying to keep her sights focused on the ceiling above their bed, trying to hold out for as long as possible as she felt her body jostled by Villanelle’s rigorous movements alongside her more tender techniques with her tongue. Villanelle could run a master class in this, Eve thought to herself, before realising the implications of that and deciding she was actually perfectly happy to have her partner all to herself.

Villanelle’s face appeared all of a sudden, hovering above Eve’s own with glistening lips and a matching sheen of sweat.

“Where are you?” Villanelle asked only mildly short of breath, “Is it not good?”

“What?” Eve gasped, genuinely bewildered by the question, “Of course it’s good!”

Villanelle looked unconvinced, her eyes flitted with concern between Eve’s own eyes and her lips. There was a pause in Villanelle’s movements below the sheets as she studied Eve suspiciously.

“What are you thinking about? You are usually more involved than this.”

Eve huffed out a laugh and lifted her hand to tuck a stray, and slightly damp strand of honey blonde hair behind Villanelle’s ear.

“Oksana, I am thinking about you. And what you’re doing, and how good you are at it.” Eve said honestly.

The tension lines on Villanelle’s forehead visibly smoothed and she smiled a smug grin that revealed her white teeth.

“Oh, really?” Villanelle asked teasingly as she retracted her fingers almost completely from Eve before plunging them back in. Eve jolted beneath her and gasped.

“R-really.” Eve assured.

Villanelle ducked her head and claimed Eve’s lips with her own, rejoicing as she felt Eve moan appreciatively into her mouth. Her fingers found their rhythm once more and Eve found that she was enjoying this even more now that Villanelle was up here with her. She could taste herself on Villanelle’s tongue and she could feel the affection from the other woman being positively poured into her.

“You feel good.” Villanelle breathed into Eve’s mouth.

Eve nodded, dislodging Villanelle’s lips from her own momentarily and then seeking them out again immediately. Eve could feel herself very near the edge now as she began to meet Villanelle’s thrusts by rocking back against her hand each time.

“So good.” Villanelle reiterated, breathing heavily now.

“Close.” Eve panted, rocking more forcefully to urge Villanelle to speed up.

“Marry me.” Villanelle whispered.

It took a moment for the words to filter through Eve’s pleasure soaked brain but when they did, her movements came screeching to a halt.

“What?” Eve demanded breathlessly, her feet planting themselves flat against the bed beneath her.

“Nothing,” Villanelle replied, her eyes betrayed her lie even as she shook her head emphatically and kept her fingers moving against Eve’s now tensed body.

“Stop, stop, stop!” Eve uttered, trying to shuffle herself up the bed and away from Villanelle’s talented digits.

“Baby, you were so close,” Villanelle pleaded in whine, pushing the forearm of her free arm across Eve’s hips to keep her in place.

“Oksana, stop!” Eve said, raising her voice firmly.

At once Villanelle’s arm moved from where it was pinning Eve down and her fingers retreated entirely, leaving Eve abruptly empty. Villanelle recoiled to her own side of the bed with an uneasy look on her face.

Silence, permeated only by the sound of both women getting their breath back, enveloped the room for a couple of long minutes.

“What did you say?” Eve said at last, her voice grim.

“I said that you were close to coming.” Villanelle answered uncertainly.

Eve let out a tired sigh.

“Before that.” Eve confirmed.

Villanelle said nothing.

“We have to talk about this, darling.” Eve spoke again, this time her voice was softer. “It’s clearly something you want.”

“You don’t want it?” Villanelle asked, her voice uncharacteristically timid.

“Why do you think you _do_ want it?” Eve replied, leaving Villanelle’s question to one side for the moment.

“It is what people do?” Villanelle reasoned.

Up until that moment, neither woman had been looking at the other, both keeping their gaze safely focused elsewhere. Now, Eve rolled onto her side, pulling the sheet up and tucking it beneath her arm before reaching for Villanelle’s hand and prompting the other woman to look at her.

“Since when have you cared about doing what people do?” Eve asked softly.

Villanelle turned her wide eyes on Eve, she had the distinct look of a kicked puppy about her, and Eve was momentarily reminded of Martin. She shook that thought from her head as swiftly as it had appeared.

“I just want to marry you.” Villanelle whispered.

Eve felt as though somebody had just touched a livewire to her skin. Then her stomach seemed to fill with sand, heavy and shifting. She wasn’t quite prepared for this.

“Why would being married be any different to how we are now?” Eve asked, swallowing uncomfortably, “It puts pressure on relationships, you know? Don’t forget I have been married before.”

Villanelle turned away and pulled her hand from Eve’s grasp.

“I will never forget that.” She mumbled.

“It’s not just a big party either,” Eve continued, “The wedding is just one day, marriage is forever. Well… supposedly.”

“I don’t care about the wedding.” Villanelle said contemptuously, but Eve ignored her.

“And it’s mostly paperwork.” Eve added, “And actually, I don’t know if we even could get married.”

“Why?” Villanelle demanded, turning quickly to look at Eve once more.

“Well, who would I be marrying? Oksana Astankova who died nearly a decade ago in a Russian prison? Or Sophie Wilson who was never even born?” Eve asked.

Eve thought she was making a good point there, and actually it hadn’t occurred to her before, but perhaps this could put an end to the issue once and for all.

“You would be marrying me.” Villanelle said, and Eve couldn’t overlook the note of hurt in her partner’s voice even before she added, “But you don’t want to.”

“I didn’t say that.” Eve replied swiftly.

Villanelle said nothing. She was on her back once more and staring resolutely at the ceiling. Eve sighed.

“I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I just don’t think we necessarily have to get married to do that.” Eve explained.

“But we could?” Villanelle asked turning her head to look at Eve, seeing the thin sliver of possibility in Eve’s words and leaping on it.

“We can think about it, I guess.” Eve compromised.

“We can think about it, I guess.” Villanelle repeated in an exact imitation of Eve’s voice before reverting to her own to add, “How romantic.”

Eve slapped Villanelle’s shoulder gently.

“Hey! You asked me to marry you mid-fuck. That was hardly romantic.” Eve countered.

“I didn’t mean to do it.” Villanelle defended with a pout.

“Even better.” Eve laughed, “You accidentally asked me to marry you and ruined a perfectly good orgasm.”

Villanelle rolled her eyes at that.

“ _You_ ruined it. I would have kept going.” She mumbled just loud enough for Eve to hear and grunt derisively at the comment.

Villanelle rolled onto her side and reached out for Eve, stroking her hair softly.

“How did The Moustache ask you?” Villanelle asked quietly.

Eve was taken aback. She hadn’t thought about that day for years, a decade even maybe. And she was surprised that Villanelle had any interest in knowing about it.

“We had been visiting his family in Krakow and the two of us were walking in the market square one morning. He just… dropped to one knee and asked me.” Eve replied as though she were remembering the morning as she spoke about it.

“And you said yes straightaway?” Villanelle prompted.

“I guess I did, yeah.” Eve confirmed a little guiltily, knowing that would hurt Villanelle.

Villanelle didn’t reply immediately but made a humming noise to let Eve know she had been listening. A moment later she spoke.

“I think my way was more romantic.” Villanelle stated with confidence.

Eve couldn’t help but laugh.

“Of course you would think that was romantic.” She muttered and Villanelle nodded resolutely.

“You will think about it?” Villanelle asked softly.

“I will. But, Oksana, I do at some point need to know why you want this so much.” Eve said, looking purposefully into Villanelle’s eyes. Villanelle nodded again.

“OK.” She agreed. And then, “Want me to finish you off?” She asked, nodding towards Eve’s waist.

Eve dropped her head back onto her pillow and groaned in amusement.


	3. A Tragic Accident

A midweek slump at work was not an unusual occurrence for Eve, but today she was feeling even less productive than usual behind her desk. Her mind was struggling to stay on the job at hand and she was relieved, as she often was, that Graham no longer shared the office with her. She could procrastinate in peace now he had gone. It had only taken a few overly amorous hello kisses from Villanelle on her visits to Eve at work before Graham had requested an office transfer.   
  
Today Eve was tasked with securing a new safe house facility for the services to keep on the books after one of their previous stock had been compromised. She had so far come up with a potential shortlist of properties but hadn’t reached a conclusion on the most suitable. She had thought she might get Villanelle to look over the possibilities and see if there were any weaknesses. But that had led her on to thinking about Villanelle and wondering how she was spending her day. Eve had killed a bit of time by sending Villanelle a message to ask what she was up to. She had swiftly received a rant about how lazy assassins had become because Villanelle had no new scenes to examine. Eve’s phone had pinged again while she had been reading through Villanelle’s message and a photo had come in. It was a selfie from Villanelle, because of course it was. She was pouting and the caption suggested that Eve leave work early today. Eve shook her head with a smile and studied that beautiful pouting face for a moment. And then the look Villanelle had worn the night before came creeping back, the wounded expression that was drawn over her face when she said that Eve didn’t want to marry her. Eve never wanted to be the cause of that expression.  
  
And it wasn’t completely true, Eve had realised. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to marry _Villanelle_ , it was just that she hadn’t thought she would marry _anybody_ again, but also that she didn’t want Villanelle to regret the decision. She hadn’t thought that Villanelle would ever want to get married, the realisation that she did was simply taking a while to settle in Eve’s mind. Maybe it would be nice to have a ring on her finger again, maybe— 

“Alright Mrs Astankova?”  
  
Eve was startled from her thoughts as Elena pushed open the door and ambled over to Eve’s desk, dropping into the chair opposite.  
  
“Don’t call me that.” Eve groaned.  
  
“She hasn’t asked you then?” Elena asked with an exaggerated look of sympathy.  
  
Eve averted her eyes from Elena at once and swallowed uncomfortably, shuffling in her chair needlessly and rearranging the print-outs of safe houses on her desk.  
  
“Oh. My. God.” Elena let out slowly, watching Eve’s obvious discomfort. “She actually asked you, didn’t she?” She let out a hoot of laughter.   
  
“Elena, I really should be getting on with this.” Eve nodded at the computer screen in front of her. Elena couldn’t tell from where she was sitting that the screen was off. It had turned itself off at least 12 minutes ago due to lack of activity.

 “When?” Elena asked, completely disregarding Eve’s plea to get on with her work, “How did she do it?”   
  
“It’s very important that I pick a new safe house for—” Eve tried to divert Elena’s line of questioning.  
  
“Oh, come off it babe. No one gives a shit which one you pick so just get the one with the pool.” Elena said, tapping a particular image on one of the sheets in front of Eve.  
  
“But that one—” Eve started.  
  
“Eve! Tell me about the proposal.” Elena cut in, waving her hand in front of Eve’s face to take her eyes off the papers spread across the desk.

 Eve wasn’t going to be able to avoid this discussion she realised.  
  
“It wasn’t really a proposal.” Eve grumbled reluctantly.  
  
“What do you mean?” Elena said, puzzled.  
  
“Well, I don’t think she meant to say it.” Eve reasoned, and it was true. Villanelle herself had said so.  
  
“What? How do you _accidentally_ propose?” Elena looked amused.  
  
“It was last night, when we were…” Eve began, and oh God, this was going to get awkward.  
  
“Having dinner?” Elena suggested “Did she mean to ask you to pass the salt?”  
  
“Not having _dinner_ …” Eve intoned, leaving her sentence hanging in the hopes that Elena could finish it off so Eve wouldn’t have to.  
  
Eve saw the exact moment that realisation hit Elena, it spread across her features just before she erupted into a howl of laughter and threw her head back in pure mirth.  
  
“That is amazing! Oh my God, I can’t wait to tell Kenny. Can you imagine how much he’ll blush? Oh, that’s just perfect. I love it!” Elena looked completely delighted at the story that Eve hadn’t quite been able to tell.  
  
Eve just shook her head, speechless. Trust Elena to take such joy out of this embarrassing moment.  
  
“And what did you say? ‘ _Yes! Oh God! Yesssss!_ ’?” Elena asked in an elaborate impression of someone in the throes of passion.  
  
It was at that moment that Eve realised the door to her office was still ajar as Julie from HR shot a curious glance into Eve’s office as she walked past. Eve hopped up from her desk and reached the door in two strides, nodding at Julie with a tight smile and then closing the door promptly before returning to her seat. Elena was still chuckling to herself.  
  
“Accident, my arse.” Elena said darkly, “She asked you then on purpose. When else are you more likely to say ‘YES!’?” Elena shrieked the last word and then descended into laughter again. Eve was glad she had closed the door.  
  
“I didn’t say yes.” Eve muttered.   
  
Elena’s laughter stopped.   
  
“You didn’t say yes?” She asked as though there was a chance she had misheard.  
  
Eve shook her head.   
  
“What did you say?” Elena asked inquisitively.  
  
“Well, I said stop.” Eve said honestly and Elena snorted, “Then I said… Well, I didn’t say yes or no, I guess.”   
  
“OK…” Elena started, “And how did that go down?” she paused and then smirked, “Excuse the pun.”   
  
Eve rolled her eyes.  
  
“I think she was upset. She thought I didn’t want to marry her.” Eve said somewhat guiltily.  
  
“Well yeah, I can see why. Not saying yes does kind of give that impression, babe.” Elena replied sombrely.  
  
Eve dropped her head into her hands. It hadn’t been her intention to upset Villanelle, or to imply that she didn’t want her in that way. _Not_ being with Villanelle hadn’t crossed Eve’s mind in years. They were inevitable, magnetic, they had been since the moment they first caught a whiff of each other’s existence. If Villanelle wanted for them to get married so badly, then Eve would do it. Eve always planned to stay happily with Villanelle for the rest of her days without the legal formality of marriage, but if for some reason Villanelle needed it, then… Eve could do it. She would do it.   
  
“What are you going to do?” Elena asked gently.  
  
Eve found that she knew the answer to that question, but she wasn’t quite ready to voice it yet. And Elena wasn’t the one who needed to hear it.   
  
“I’ll figure something out.” Eve replied, diplomatically.  
  
“Get her a kitten or something.” Elena suggested, waving her hand dismissively, “Distract her with that. A guy I knew from uni did that when his girlfriend started banging on about a wedding.” Elena suggested.   
  
“A kitten?” Eve asked aghast. “Get Villanelle a kitten? You have met her, haven’t you? She’s not really an animal person… I’m 99% sure she killed one of my hens, you know?” Eve trailed off as she remembered the suspicious death of that particular chicken a few years back. It had just disappeared.   
  
“Fair.” Elena nodded, “I’m pretty sure the girlfriend broke up with that guy, now I think about.” She added thoughtfully, “I think the cat’s still alive though.”  
  
“Great.” Eve said sardonically.   
  
“Right, I better get back to work,” Elena let out as she stood from her chair and headed to the door, then stopped and turned around to face Eve.  
 **  
**“You should just marry her.” Elena suggested with a shrug. “You guys are never going to break up anyway.”  
  
Eve just hummed in response. Elena was right. Elena was often right, Eve knew that from experience.   
  
“And get the one with the pool!” Elena called over her shoulder before she pulled Eve’s office door shut.   
  
Eve cast her eyes back over the images of safe houses before her and decided she might as well go for the one with the pool. It was true, nobody really gave a shit anyway and she had bigger decisions to occupy her mind now. And a couple of phone calls to make.   
  
  
  
Villanelle found herself in the same position she had been a few days earlier. She was in the home office, waiting for someone to answer her phone call. There was no work for her to do today; apparently it was a slow murder week or something. Villanelle sighed and listened to the incessant ringing of the phone until she at last heard someone pick up the receiver.  
  
“Привет.” Came the voice.  
  
“Hello Irina, How is school? You should come and visit soon.” Villanelle said robotically and then waited with a smile on her face.  
  
“Very funny.” Came Irina’s unimpressed response. “I’ll get my dad.”  
  
“No!” Villanelle called, sitting up in her chair.  
  
Irina paused.  
  
“No. I… I want to talk… to you.” Villanelle said. Ugh. This was painful. Having to consult with a child. It was humiliating.   
  
“You do?” replied Irina, suspiciously.  
  
“Yes. You are good at this shit, and I… would like your opinion. Please.” Villanelle said through gritted teeth.  
  
“Ohhh,” came the smug response from Irina. “I see. And what can I help you with?”   
  
Villanelle could almost see that self-satisfied grin on the teenager’s face. After all, she was a teenager now, not the child that Villanelle still thought of her as.  
  
“Don’t be a little shit about it, OK?” Villanelle replied fiercely.   
  
“That is not a good way to talk to someone when you need their help.” Irina said knowingly.   
  
Villanelle growled.   
  
“Fine! OK. Let’s just do this then.” She let out unenthusiastically.  
  
“What do you want, Villanelle?” Irina asked.  
  
“I want Eve to marry me.” Villanelle said simply.   
  
“Huh.” Said Irina with a note of surprise.   
  
“What?” Villanelle demanded, feeling a little offended by the tone of Irina’s voice.   
  
“No. Nothing. I just didn’t think it would be that.” Irina brushed off her surprise.  
  
“Why not? I have—” Villanelle started to defend herself.  
  
“Have you asked her?” Irina asked, not allowing Villanelle a chance to linger too long on her initial reaction.   
  
“Yes.” Villanelle said grumpily.   
  
“And she said no?” Irina asked.  
  
“No. But she didn’t say yes also.” Villanelle grumbled.  
  
“Well how did you ask her?” Irina asked openly.  
  
“That does not matter.” Villanelle replied hastily.   
  
“It does if you—” Irina began.  
  
“She said she will think about it, but I want her to say yes. How do I do that?” Villanelle asked, throwing her dignity out the window to avoid discussing her sex life.   
  
“Well…” Irina replied, elongating the word as she thought about her response.   
  
“Well?” Villanelle demanded.  
  
“Why do you want to marry her?” Irina asked.  
  
“It’s what people do.” Villanelle repeated what she had told Eve.  
  
“No, no. That is not good enough. And you don’t give a shit what people do.” Irina pointed out.  
  
“Don’t swear.” Villanelle scolded.  
  
“What?!” Irina exclaimed, “The other day you called me a little cu—”  
  
“Children should not swear.” Villanelle raised her voice authoritatively over Irina’s.  
  
“I am not a child and you are changing the subject.” Irina said blankly. “Why do you want to marry Eve?”  
  
There was silence on the line for a moment or two as Villanelle gathered her thoughts.  
  
“I am always going to love her and I am always going to want to be with her. I want it to be… solid and… Proper? I want to wear nice rings so people know we have a place to belong to... A person to belong with.” Villanelle voiced her thoughts aloud, trying to ignore the heat rising in her cheeks as she spilled her guts to this annoying teenager.   
  
Irina didn’t reply straight away.   
  
“Hello?” Villanelle said after a moment, pulling the phone from her ear to peer at it curiously.   
  
“That is good.” Said Irina. When she finally spoke her voice was a little strained. “You should say that.” She added.  
  
“Really?” Asked Villanelle, “Just that?”   
  
“Yes. It is the truth, isn’t it?” Irina checked.  
  
“Yes, but—” Villanelle began. It wasn’t particularly poetic or persuasive.  
  
“The truth is always the best.” Irina said decisively, her voice returning to its regular timbre, “If she says yes, then she is saying yes to a question you have asked for the right reasons. If she says no then… get a cat?”  
  
“I don’t want a cat!” Villanelle replied repulsed.  
  
“She will say yes.” Irina said firmly.   
  
“You think so?” Villanelle asked quietly.   
  
“I know everything.” Irina said deadly serious and nodding, not that Villanelle could see her.   
  
“You do not.” Villanelle rebuked immediately.   
  
“I do.” Irina insisted.   
  
“Whatever. Don’t tell your dad about this conversation, OK?” Villanelle warned, trying to inject the sound of a lethal threat into her voice.   
  
“How will you stop me?” Irina laughed  
  
“You better not…” Villanelle growled.   
  
“PAPA!!” Irina shouted before abruptly hanging up the phone.   
  
“That little shit!” Villanelle spat as she too hung up. The kid had better have been joking about telling Konstantin or she would never live that phone call down. And Irina would not live to tell the story a second time.  
  
  
  
On the outskirts of Moscow Irina was chuckling and mentally patting herself on the back for freaking out Villanelle when the phone that she had just hung up rang again. She picked it up.  
  
“Oh, calm down you big baby, I will not tell my dad.” She drawled into the phone, relishing the rare moment of power over her father’s old asset.   
  
“What?” Came a voice Irina wasn’t expecting.   
  
“Oh. Who is this?” Irina asked. The voice was familiar but she couldn’t quite place it.  
  
“Uh. Eve. It’s Eve.”   
  
“Oh!” Irina breathed out. “Hello Eve, how are you?”  
  
“I’m… very well thank-you. How are you?” Eve asked.  
  
“I am well. You’re much more polite than your girlfriend.” Irina pointed out.  
  
“My… girlfriend. Yes. She’s…” Eve trailed off. To this day that word – _girlfriend_ – just never felt like the right one to describe her relationship with Villanelle.   
  
“Very rude.” Irina finished for her.   
  
“She has her moments.” Eve agreed.   
  
There was a long pause.   
  
“Uh… Is your dad around?” Eve asked eventually.  
  
“Yep!” Irina replied and then Eve heard her yell for her father.   
  
There was some rustling on the other end of the line followed by heavy footsteps.  
  
“Do you actually want something this time?” Eve heard Konstantin’s slightly faint voice demand.  
  
“Eve is on the phone.” Irina said, and then evidently passed said phone to her father because Eve was then met with an urgent voice.  
  
“Eve? What has happened? She is OK?” Konstantin demanded swiftly.  
  
Eve was touched by his immediate fear for Villanelle’s safety, and worried that it made her true reason for calling all the more ridiculous. Obviously Konstantin thought the only reason Eve would call him would be if Villanelle was in mortal danger or already dead.  
  
“She’s fine. Absolutely fine.” Eve reassured. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you.”  
  
“I am not worried,” Konstantin said brusquely. “She is always fine. I trained her.”   
  
“Right.” Eve agreed, thankful that Konstantin couldn’t see the eye-roll she issued at his overt self-assuredness only seconds after sounding like a concerned new mother receiving an unexpected phone call from the nursery.  
  
“So?” Konstantin prompted, “What do you want?”   
  
Oh God. Eve remembered with a jolt what she wanted. Why was she doing this? Why did she think it was necessary or a good idea? Do they even have this tradition in Russia? Konstantin and Irina had visited Eve and Villanelle more than once in the past few years, and they had met up for a weekend in Prague a couple of months back, but even with the additional time spent together, Eve and Konstantin’s conversations were always forced. Now, on the phone with him, Eve realised how absurd her decision to consult him on her plan had been. She already knew Villanelle would say yes because technically Villanelle had already posed the question. It had just seemed like the right thing to do. Niko had asked her father the same question.  
  
“I wanted to ask you something. Well, run something by you.” Eve stammered, she could hardly back out now after all.  
  
“Yes?” Konstantin asked impatiently.  
  
Eve took a deep, fortifying breath.   
  
“I am going to ask Villanelle to marry me.” Eve said as quickly as humanly possible.   
  
There was a brief pause and then a wheezing chuckle.  
  
“Perhaps she is good at this shit after all.” Konstantin said, though it sounded as though he was speaking to himself rather than Eve.  
  
“Um… What?” Eve asked cautiously.   
  
“Are you asking me if you can ask her?” Konstantin questioned dubiously.  
  
“Uh… Yes? Oh god. That’s awful isn’t it? Who asks the father’s permission these days? We’re meant to be smashing the patriarchy. What am I doing?” Eve rambled aloud, feeling more ridiculous by the minute.  
  
“I am not her father.” Konstantin said thoughtfully, entirely disregarding Eve’s quiet ranting. “But I think you should do it.”   
  
“Of course you’re not but I thought… and then… Oh. You do?” Eve replied, finally catching onto Konstantin’s words.   
  
“I do.” Konstantin said gravely and then he laughed, “I do! Ha! Do you get it?”  
  
Eve was momentarily stunned. She had never heard genuine pleased laughter from Konstantin. Also, she had expected him to mock her more, or make her feel more uncomfortable for even daring to ask the question, perhaps he might have questioned her motives but… apparently not.  
  
“I get it, yes. It’s… you’re very funny.” Eve said uncertainly.   
  
Konstantin let out a satisfied sigh.   
  
“Well, good luck with that, Eve Polastri,” he said with some finality, before speaking again, “And remember, if you hurt her, I know some very skilled people who can make your death look like a tragic accident.”   
  
He laughed heartily and Eve felt obliged to join him. They were both still laughing somewhat manically when Konstantin hung up the phone.   
  
Eve replaced her phone on the desk, her faked laughter subsiding instantly. She raked her fingers through her hair.   
  
“Jesus.” Eve muttered to herself.


	4. Can I Tempt You?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I don't know if 'warts and all' is an expression everywhere. In the UK it means sort of like including the bad bits or in spite of the bad bits, type thing. Tony is not literally suggesting he is covered in warts.

After her phone call with Konstantin, Eve was feeling an unusual number of emotions. A large part of her was proud of herself for making the call in the first place and facing up to Konstantin with her question. Sure, he reminded her that he was unequivocally _not_ Villanelle’s father, but as far as Eve was concerned, he was as good as. Or better really, considering the tales Eve has now heard about Villanelle’s actual father. Eve was pretty sure that deep down Konstantin and Villanelle did see themselves having a father-daughter relationship, not that either of them would ever be emotionally available enough to admit it. Not to each other, at least.   
  
And yes, Eve did feel slightly silly for seeking Konstantin’s permission to ask Villanelle to marry her. Actually, the more she thought about that the sillier she felt. After all, nobody but Villanelle could give herself away. Not that marrying someone meant giving yourself away… God, the patriarchy really ran deep and Eve was realising it more with each new thought and assumption. She really had wandered blindly into marriage the first time around.   
  
Also circulating Eve’s thoughts was the small fact that Villanelle had already _technically_ done the asking as well. But that was neither here nor there. Eve wanted Villanelle to know that she too wanted to take this step, that she wasn’t just humouring Villanelle’s sudden and surprising need for legal normality.   
  
Then there was the third feeling churning in Eve’s busy brain matter. The sort of buzz of anxiety she felt whenever she got down to the nitty-gritty of this: the fact that she would be marrying again. Something she had never imagined she would do. But Villanelle is not Niko. The two couldn’t be more opposite if they were a completely different species. And there was no way in heaven or hell that married life with Villanelle would be like married life with Niko. Villanelle was physically incapable of being boring. It was probably one of the few things she was physically incapable of, seeing as she still kept up the exercise routine that made her an impenetrable assassin despite no longer actually being one.  No, Villanelle didn’t do boring. It went against her very nature. Villanelle even made cleaning the house into catwalk show. Literally. She used the task of vacuuming to break in any new shoes that she had recently purchased, whether they were elegant heels or shit-kicking boots. The first time Eve had ventured downstairs from her office to find Villanelle vacuuming the living room in six-inch heels she had choked on her last mouthful coffee and sprayed it across the floor. Villanelle had been none too impressed by the stain on her recently cleaned carpet.  
  
Eve breathed out a laugh at that memory. Villanelle hadn’t thought for a second that heels were unusual attire for housework. And then there had been the time they redecorated their bedroom. Villanelle had wanted them to paint each other naked and then press their imprints into the wall. She had seen it on a canvas in the _Centre Pompidou_ during her time in Paris. Eve had remained unconvinced. Now, as she mulled over all of the decidedly un-boring things about Villanelle, Eve felt her blood pressure drop from the dizzying heights it had reached. Marrying Villanelle wouldn’t be slipping back into a lukewarm way of life. Marrying Villanelle would be offering reassurance to the woman she adored, the woman who drove her mad and saved her from the monotony she had failed to notice. Villanelle was an enigma to many; a powerhouse of charisma and treacherous charm, but beneath it there still lurked a lost soul. That lost soul became less lost with Eve, and Eve wanted to offer it safety and assurance once and for all.  
  
Eve’s mind had eased itself with these thoughts and she nodded resolutely to her still dormant computer screen before shoving herself and her wheeled office chair away from the desk and standing abruptly. There could only be one slight hiccup in her plans, and she needed to check in with someone else before going any further with them. Eve steeled herself and strode with a confidence that became increasingly faked as she left her office and turned down the corridor.   
  
  
  
The door looked like any other in the building. Dark, varnished wood, and a brass name plate shining at eye-height. But the name on this door is one that didn’t sit comfortably in Eve’s mind. **Carolyn Martens.** She was neither fish nor fowl. She was firmly employed by MI6, but Eve had been more than once offered reason to question Carolyn’s loyalty. Years on though, and Carolyn’s name remained in copperplate on the door in front of Eve so someone somewhere obviously trusted Carolyn. Eve sucked in a deep breath and knocked twice on the door.  
  
“Come in!” Called the voice from inside.   
  
Eve shook out her arms in an attempt to rid them of the tension that had taken up residence in her shoulders, and pushed her way into Carolyn’s office.   
  
Carolyn was seated behind her desk, a phone clamped to her ear. She held up a single finger to Eve in a gesture asking her to wait one moment, and then she rolled her eyes as though whatever conversation she was embroiled in was beyond tedious.   
  
“I don’t see why the pool is necessary, but yes, fine. Get that one.” She said disinterestedly.   
  
Eve forced her face to remain neutral. She got a small kick out of knowing that a decision she made had led to Carolyn having to partake in what she obviously saw as a dull endeavour. There was a pause in the conversation.   
  
“No, no, don’t go back to the drawing board. Get the one with the pool. Swimming is excellent exercise.” Carolyn said swiftly, and flicked a curious glance at Eve.  
  
“Fantastic. Yes. Excellent.” Carolyn muttered into the phone after leaving barely enough time for whoever was on the other end to respond. She hung up and sighed.   
  
“Honestly, it’s just a safe house. I couldn’t give a fiddler’s fart which one we buy.” Carolyn said lightly to Eve, who simply offered a one-shouldered shrug in response and remained silent.   
  
“Anyway,” Carolyn breathed. “Eve, you want something. What is it?”  
  
Eve, for a mad moment, wondered if Carolyn ever had visitors who simply stopped by for a chat like Elena did with Eve. Surely even Carolyn was capable of being lonely every now and then. The two of them hadn’t exchanged more than passing nods and necessary pleasantries in the hallways of MI6 for a long time.   
  
Eve opened her mouth to respond and then closed it again as she pondered her opening statement.   
  
“Sorry, that was rude.” Carolyn said with absolutely nothing apologetic in her tone. “Are you well? And… Villanelle? Sophie? Whatever you call her… is she… well?” Carolyn was clearly fraught with the prospect of small talk.   
  
Or perhaps Carolyn didn’t get lonely. Perhaps Carolyn was purely business.  
  
“Sophie Wilson. Is she… real?” Eve asked, doing Carolyn a rare favour and ignoring her floundered questions.  
  
“Oh. Eve.” Carolyn said, disappointed, “Of course she’s not. Are you feeling alright?”  
  
“No, no,” Eve said hurriedly, “I mean, legally… She exists?”   
  
“I see,” Carolyn nodded, “Yes, she exists. She has a birth certificate, a driver’s license, a tax code… a misdemeanour charge for being drunk in charge of a bicycle in 2012…” Carolyn issued a tight-lipped smirk at Eve’s puzzled expression and then went on, “I told them to add that. Keeps it believable, you know?”   
  
Eve couldn’t begin to imagine Villanelle being drunk in charge of bicycle so she struggled to see how it made anything more believable, but that was beside the point.   
  
“Right.” Eve nodded. “So she could… for example…” oh God, Eve would be done with awkward interactions for the rest of her life after today.  
  
“For example?” Carolyn prompted impatiently. There was a knowing look in her eye that Eve was not enjoying.   
  
“She could get married? Sophie Wilson could get married?” Eve let out with a resigned huff and averted her eyes. Carolyn smiled.  
  
“She could. Yes.” Carolyn agreed, keeping her piercing gaze fixed on Eve.  
  
“Good. Great. Thanks.” Eve let out, flashing a forced smile and beginning to back towards the door. Behind her she could hear Carolyn chuckle softly and then stop.

“You managed to find someone to love who you actually like.” Carolyn called before Eve could vanish from the room.  
  
It was a throwback comment to a very long time ago and it struck Eve like an electric shock. Carolyn raised her eyebrows at Eve. The last time Carolyn had made any references to love and marriage she had been referring to Niko and her sentiment had been quite different.  
  
“I… Yeah. I guess I did.” Eve mumbled as the truth of the statement hit her. Villanelle and Niko would always be different. At the very core of it, to Eve, they were totally different. Love takes many shapes. Not all of those shapes fit happily ever after, but occasionally there is one that does.  
  
“Congratulations Eve.” Said Carolyn evenly, and maybe Eve was kidding herself, but there seemed to be a scrap of sincerity there.  
  
  
  
Eve had stopped in at her own office to make a couple of final calls for the day before slipping back into her coat and cramming her glasses case back into her purse. It was just near enough a reasonable time to call it a day. She had achieved next to nothing work-wise, but on a personal level it had been a day well spent. Eve was satisfied with that even if her employers might not be. She left the office and got into the elevator down to the main entrance. Eve had a plan, she had permission from the member of a Russian crime syndicate and she had assurances that her partner legally existed. What more could a woman want? Eve smiled to herself in the mirrored wall of the elevator and shook out her hair to wake it up a bit.   
  
The elevator dinged as Eve reached the ground floor where she stepped out to be greeted by a familiar sound. Eve would know that joyful cackle anywhere. And there, just to her left was Villanelle. She was perched on top of the security desk, her legs swinging over the edge of it as she leaned back to examine the multiscreen monitor that Tony the security guy was pointing at. In her hand was a half-eaten apple. Eve ambled across the lobby, heels clicking on the marble floors, to reach her.   
  
“Hello Darling… and… Tony. I didn’t know you were coming in today.” Eve issued as she reached the desk.   
  
Tony the security guy touched his hat in greeting and Villanelle turned to welcome Eve, kicking her heels against the desk as she pivoted.  
  
“Baby! There you are. We were watching you in the lift.” Villanelle said almost proudly. She was using her Sophie Wilson accent. Eve never stopped being amazed at how she could switch between accents so effortlessly, and never seemed to be caught out.  
  
“How… creepy.” Eve replied and Villanelle nodded with a smile.

Villanelle took a large bite of her apple and chewed it thoughtfully before holding the apple out to Eve.  
  
“Can I tempt you? …Eve?” Villanelle said with a smirk and a mouthful of apple.  
  
Eve rolled her eyes. If she had a pound for every time someone pointed out the biblical implications of her name... But behind Villanelle there was a guffaw of laughter from Tony.   
  
“The apple!” Tony choked out through his laughter, “Because you’re Eve!” He exclaimed, shaking his head.  
  
Villanelle showed her teeth as she cast a cheek-splitting smile over her shoulder at Tony. And Jesus, it hadn’t been that funny as far as Eve was concerned. Tony must lead a sheltered life, she decided.  
  
“Oh, you have a funny one here, Mrs Polastri.” He let out as his laughter finally began to ease.   
  
The smile dropped from Villanelle’s face like a rock into a well.  
  
“ _Ms_ Polastri.” Villanelle snarled and Tony looked alarmed, his eyes wide in sudden fright, he raised both his hands in surrender.  
  
“Of course!” He stammered, “I’m sorry, Ms Polastri. My mistake.”  
  
Eve gave Villanelle a light shove on the shoulder in reprimand and received a look of pure innocence in return.

“It’s fine, Tony. Really.” Eve assured him but he still wore a look of mild terror. And he didn’t even know that the woman he had just accidently pissed off could end his life before his next breath. Villanelle’s aura of danger clearly remained intact.   
  
“I hear you’re getting married, Tony.” Eve tried, attempting to diffuse the situation with a smile.

Villanelle looked between the two of them, her furious glare had smoothed and was replaced with an unreadable expression on her face.  
  
“Oh! Yes.” Replied Tony, perking up immeasurably. “She said yes,” he confirmed, “Turns out she loves me, warts and all.” He added with a chuckle.   
  
Villanelle exploded into laughter as though Tony had just said the funniest thing she had ever heard. Eve looked at her in confusion for a moment before joining in half-heartedly when she noticed how pleased Tony looked with his non-joke. Well, pleased and relieved that he seemed to have survived Villanelle’s wrath.  
  
“Well, congratulations to you both.” Eve said when Villanelle’s laughter had lessened enough that she could be heard.   
  
“Thank-you very much. _Ms_ Polastri.” Tony replied and Villanelle laughed once more, hopping off the desk and pointing a finger at Tony with a smile before lacing her hand with Eve’s.  
  
“Ready to go baby? I have been waiting for _hours_.” Villanelle groaned. Eve doubted that she had been there for more than fifteen minutes tops, but didn’t argue.   
  
“Sorry, I didn’t know you were here. You don’t usually pick me up from work.” Eve pointed out.  
  
“I wanted to surprise you.” Villanelle said with a pout.   
  
Eve narrowed her eyes at Villanelle.  
  
“Fine! It was so boring at home.” Villanelle admitted, “Now you’re done with work, so it will be fun again.”   
  
Eve laughed.   
  
“Right. Sure. Because I am a non-stop party.” Eve said self-deprecatingly.  
  
Villanelle grabbed Eve’s other hand so that she clasped both within her own and pulled Eve toward her, placing a simple kiss on her lips then pulling back so that she could make eye contact.  
  
“Everything is fun with you.” Villanelle murmured. And Eve felt that final bit of worry ebb from her mind.  
  
“I think we should remodel the kitchen.” Villanelle announced, releasing one of Eve’s hands and striding towards the exit of the building.  
  
Eve was still in a slight daze from Villanelle’s previous statement and just managed to gather enough wherewithal to cast a wave over her shoulder at Tony as she was dragged out through the revolving glass door.  
  
Outside on the street, Eve’s mind caught up.   
  
“You think we should remodel the kitchen?” Eve repeated.   
  
Villanelle simply nodded once, looking resolutely ahead as she navigated her way down the busy street to the tube station at the other end.  
  
“You want to get married _and_ remodel the kitchen.” Eve amended, almost trotting along beside Villanelle in order to keep up.   
  
“Well,” Villanelle started, “If I have to choose then I think we should get married. The shitty kitchen can wait.”  
  
“It’s not a shitty kitchen.” Eve grumbled, though admittedly the kitchen could do with updating. They had reached the station now and Eve rummaged in her purse for her card as they neared the barrier.  
  
“You like the kitchen? OK, let’s get married then.” Villanelle said with a sly grin as though she had laid a cunning trap for Eve.

“No, no, you’re right. The kitchen does look a bit tired now you mention it.” Eve replied. Eve was used to Villanelle’s traps by now.   
  
“Eve!” Villanelle whined, elongating the word to extreme proportions.   
  
Eve gave a throaty laugh as she tapped her card against the reader at the tube barrier and slipped through as the gates snapped close behind her. Eve continued walking towards the escalator as Villanelle huffed her way through the barrier behind her and jogged a couple of steps to catch up.   
  
“Have you… been thinking about it?” Villanelle asked, uncharacteristically timid.   
  
“Well, you only just raised the idea, but I guess new kitchen cupboards would be good and we could get nicer counters…” Eve mused, fully aware that Villanelle had not been enquiring about Eve’s kitchen design ideas.  
  
“Not the kitchen!” Villanelle exclaimed.  
  
Eve stopped walking and tugged Villanelle to one side of tunnel walkway to avoid the stampeding commuters.  
  
“I know you weren’t talking about the kitchen, darling.” Eve said gently, “And yes, I have been thinking about it. Of course I have.”  
  
Villanelle’s shoulders relaxed a bit, but not entirely.  
  
“And?” Villanelle asked, equal parts eager and anxious.   
  
“And I will keep thinking about it.” Eve replied.  
  
“Oh.” Said Villanelle, her shoulders drooping entirely now.  
  
That defeated look on Villanelle almost physically pained Eve but she needed to keep her cards to her chest for now, which clearly would mean distracting Villanelle from the topic of marriage. Somehow. It seemed Villanelle was entirely set on the idea.    
  
Eve smiled at Villanelle in what she hoped was a reassuring way and tugged her back into the tide of harassed Londoners.   
  
“Come on, let’s go home. You did say you wanted me home early today, I assumed you had some activity in mind for us?” Eve said with a suggestive glance over her shoulder at Villanelle.  
  
Villanelle perked up at that and grabbed Eve’s hand again.  
  
“I have several nice ideas.” Villanelle confirmed as she took the lead and waded into the current of people, using her elbows to clear a way through them and ignoring the tuts and disgruntled looks she received. Villanelle had no patience for tube travel at rush hour and Eve had given up issuing repeated apologies for her partner. Eve allowed herself to be pulled along in Villanelle’s wake.   
  
“Oh, and Oksana?” Eve said as Villanelle pulled her onto the tube, “You’re not busy this weekend are you? I thought we would take a little trip.”   
  



	5. Practicing Spontaneity

It was Friday evening and Villanelle was feeling particularly alert. She had met Eve from work at the end of the day, like she had earlier in the week when Eve had first mentioned the trip, but this time with a large suitcase. Together they had crossed London to St Pancras Station and caught the Eurostar bound for Paris Gare du Nord.   
  
Currently they were on the train, seated in the wide seats of the First Class carriage though Eve had shuffled herself right to the edge of hers so that she could rest her head on Villanelle’s shoulder as she was lulled to sleep by the rhythmic sounds of the train on the track. Villanelle was not sleeping. Villanelle had been watching the passing scenery turn from concrete grey to muted green as the train had left London and made its way to Kent where it would disappear beneath the sea. Now that the train had descended, the scenery was replaced by the tunnel walls and with only darkness outside and the flashes of regularly placed lights, Villanelle found that she was staring at the reflection of her own face in the window.  
  
Villanelle had been surprised when Eve had suggested this weekend away. In fact, Eve had not _suggested_ it at all. By the time she checked offhandedly whether Villanelle had plans for the weekend, Eve had already booked their train and hotel. It was most unlike Eve. Not unlike her to be thoughtful and romantic, but Eve tended to be more about little signals of her love, like teasing affection and constant warmth. Grand gestures and travel plans, those were Villanelle’s speciality. And Eve had even booked them First Class train tickets and _that_ was definitely a Villanelle move. This switch in roles had left Villanelle unsettled. She suspected that Eve was feeling guilty for her reaction to Villanelle’s ad hoc proposal and this trip was an attempt to make it right. Either that, or Eve was bringing her away to simply distract her. Eve’s lack of answer either way to Villanelle’s question had made her anxious. Villanelle was not used to being anxious. It was uncomfortable and Villanelle discovered that she was almost, _almost_ , annoyed at Eve for making her feel like this. Villanelle had proposed that they get married, not suggested they switch laundry detergent and Eve had said… nearly nothing. Why didn’t Eve want to marry her? Villanelle had been trying all week to take Irina’s advice and explain to Eve exactly _why_ she wanted to get married, but Eve had been sidestepping and avoiding the conversation. Villanelle sighed and watched her reflection do the same.  
  
It had been a while since they had last been in Paris though and Villanelle had missed it. Last time they came they had stayed in a far grander part of the city than where Villanelle had once lived. Regardless of Eve’s ulterior motives for bringing her, Villanelle wanted to enjoy the weekend in her favourite city.  
  
Villanelle hadn’t grown up with dreams of a life in Paris, but Anna had. Villanelle had caught those dreams from her, or maybe she had stolen them, and she had adopted them for herself. Anna never got to Paris, but Villanelle did, and she became part of the very essence of the city. When she lived there Villanelle took on the characteristics of the capital. She became intimidating and unattainable, on the surface mesmerising and yet dark and dangerous just beneath. Villanelle taught herself to embody Paris itself.  
  
London on the other hand… Villanelle did not love London. In Paris, a flash of eye contact on the metro could lead to entangled limbs and satisfaction. In London, a flash of eye contact on the tube was followed by a suspicious frown and a switching of seats. Not that Villanelle went on subterranean prowls these days. She just thought it summed up the difference between the two cities nicely. Villanelle did not love London, but she did love Eve. And Eve was worth the cold and damp. Still, it was always nice to return for a couple of days.  
  
Villanelle studied her own slightly blurred face in the darkened train window. She was aging well. Perhaps there was now the hint of frown lines forming between her eyebrows, but barely. Villanelle frowned experimentally and watched as the lines deepened. She unscrunched her forehead and smoothed the remaining lines with a single finger. Those lines might be deeper if she had spent the last five years differently. Or they might not be there at all. On a parallel lifeline perhaps Villanelle would not have even reached the age of thirty, the age that she was now. Villanelle considered that fact, vaguely aware of how close that potential alternative had been at times, and then she made a decision. Villanelle would pick up some night cream while she was in Paris, something light that smelled divine to help keep those lines to a minimum.   
  
Against her side, Eve stirred and lifted her head from Villanelle’s warm shoulder, glancing around momentarily in confusion and looking up at Villanelle.  
  
“Hello Eve,” said Villanelle simply.  
  
Eve pushed her head against Villanelle once more and breathed in deeply before sighing in contentment.   
  
“Hello Oksana,” she smiled.  
  
“Don’t say that too loudly or Sophie Wilson won’t make it through passport control.” Villanelle teased and felt Eve laugh lightly against her.   
  
It was a bit of a loaded joke. Whenever the pair of them left the country, or re-entered it, Eve would become incredibly tense when it came to having Villanelle’s passport checked. It seemed Eve lived in fear of someone stopping Villanelle, or finding something suspicious about her identification documents. Once, Villanelle had made some snide comment in Italian about the speed of checking at an airport in Italy and the irate clerk had got his own back by flagging up some imagined discrepancy between Sophie Wilson’s passport and the driving licence he had demanded to see as secondary identification. Villanelle had been interviewed for nearly an hour whilst Eve had heart palpitations in the departure lounge. By the time Villanelle breezed back in as though nothing had happened, they had missed their flight. Eve had given Villanelle the silent treatment all the way back to Gatwick.  
  
“Aren’t you tired?” Eve questioned with a yawn. It had turned into quite an intense week for Eve. She had been putting things in place for her marriage quest and working overtime to distract Villanelle from her own.   
  
“Nope.” Villanelle replied blankly.  
  
“God, I’m tired.” Eve said, settling more comfortably against Villanelle when Villanelle put her arm around Eve’s shoulder and rubbed her thumb along it comfortingly.   
  
“Where are we staying? You should have let me book it.” Villanelle said, turning her head slightly to rest her cheek on Eve’s hair.   
  
“No. It’s my treat.” Eve said, just as she had said the other eight times Villanelle had told Eve the same thing. “The hotel isn’t far from your old apartment actually, with views of the Sacre Coeur.”  
  
“ _Sacre Coeur._ ” Villanelle corrected in a perfect French accent. “You Americans always butcher the French language.”  
  
“Oh, I am sorry, _mademoiselle_.” Eve replied, purposefully mispronouncing the word. Villanelle scoffed.  
  
“Near my old apartment? Am I going to have to strip search you for cutlery before bed?” Villanelle asked cheekily with a note of flirtation.   
  
Eve laughed, because she could do that now when the years-old stabbing incident cropped up. Or at least, she could usually laugh.  
  
“You’re very welcome to.” Eve replied evenly.   
  
“Mmm. Good.” Villanelle sighed, “I wonder who lives there now. Do you think they threw out all my stuff? I think there’s a stack of euros under a tile beneath the bathroom sink, you know.”  
  
“God, that bathroom was absurd. Those fucking taps…” Eve chuckled, thinking back to the room she had almost forgotten.  
  
“Hey! Those taps are beautiful. I had some very good times in that bathroom.” Villanelle replied wistfully.  
  
Eve squawked indignantly at that.   
  
“Don’t be jealous baby. I used to dream of fucking _you_ in that apartment. I used to think about it a lot.” Villanelle said in her own brand of reassurance.  
  
In the early days, Eve would have been floored by that statement and unable to formulate a proper response. Now, she was more accustomed to Villanelle’s very open way of talking about sex, what she wants, how she wants it and where.  
  
“Oh yeah? You’ll have to tell me what you used to think about.” Eve replied lowly, suddenly conscious of the other passengers in the carriage and the fact that Villanelle hadn’t bothered to lower her voice.  
  
“Why don’t I show you? We could go back. I can easily break into that place. Oh, I would love to finally fuck you in that bed like we should have done in the first place.” Villanelle was getting excited and Eve could hear it in her voice and feel it in the thrumming of her body.  
  
“Oksana!” Eve hissed. “We are not breaking into someone else’s apartment to have sex in their bed.” She whispered.  
  
“ _My_ bed.” Villanelle replied firmly.   
  
“Yeah, they’ve probably bought a new bed by now.” Eve pointed out.  
  
Villanelle huffed.   
  
“I will fuck you in the bathroom then. Nobody would change that bathroom. Then we could get the cash from under the sink.” Villanelle said obstinately.   
  
Eve thought to herself that pink tiles and golden fish head taps certainly weren’t to everybody’s taste, but she didn’t have the heart to point that out to Villanelle.  
  
“Our hotel suite has a perfectly adequate bathroom. I checked.” Eve promised.   
  
And it was true, she had checked. Villanelle still had a thing for bathrooms and Eve knew that. Eve could do without the cold tiles against her back and the bruises from taps and corners, but Villanelle always made it worth her while in the end.   
  
Villanelle opened her mouth to reply.   
  
“And we don’t need the cash.” Eve said decisively, pre-empting Villanelle’s secondary complaint. She felt Villanelle slump in disappointment beneath her, so she raised her head from Villanelle’s shoulder to look at her with a soft smile.  
  
“We’re going to have a great weekend. We can do anything you like. But no breaking and entering, OK darling?” Eve said, holding Villanelle’s gaze with her own.  
  
“Ugh. Fine.” Villanelle agreed begrudgingly.  
  
  
  
Eve had been right, their hotel suite did have a view of _Sacre Coeur_ and a perfectly adequate bathroom. Villanelle had prowled around the bedroom and the bathroom, appraising everything closely, before agreeing that Eve had done a decent job of choosing somewhere that fitted her exacting hotel standards.   
  
By the time the train had reached Gare du Nord and the couple had caught a cab to the hotel it was quite late in the evening. After their discussion on the train, Eve had fallen asleep once more. Villanelle had returned to staring at her own reflection until the train emerged in Calais and her face was replaced with sleepy sweeping fields and sunset. Her mood had darkened with the sky as Villanelle continued to stew silently in her anxieties over Eve’s disinterest in marriage.   
  
It was entirely dark now that they had reached the hotel and Villanelle could tell that Eve was tired still and would probably be quite happy to go more or less straight to bed.  
  
“Where shall we go for dinner? What was your favourite place when you lived here?” Eve asked, forgoing her usual habit of emptying everything from her suitcase and finding homes for it in drawers and cupboards.   
  
“There were many.” Villanelle replied dismissively. “But it is late and you are tired, let’s go to bed.”   
  
“What? No.” Eve replied hurriedly, “We’re in Paris, in your old neighbourhood, it’s Friday night. What would you have been doing if you were still here? We’ll do that.” Eve suggested, trying to sound more enthusiastic and awake than she felt.  
  
Villanelle smirked at Eve with a challenge glinting in her eye.   
  
Eve realised as she said it that she had just set Villanelle up nicely.   
  
“You want to go to bars and find a woman with hair like yours and then fuck her?” Villanelle suggested as though she had simply named a restaurant she had heard was good.  
  
“Jesus, Oksana. You did it that often?” Eve asked, not quite sure how to feel about that revelation.   
  
“Mmmhmm.” Villanelle hummed, “And I would call them Eve too.” she added.  
  
“You would not.” Eve drawled.  
  
“I would!” Villanelle insisted and Eve stared at her until she decided that, yeah, Villanelle was telling the truth.  
  
“Well that’s… flattering and disturbing, I guess.” Eve said slowly.  
  
“Don’t worry, I always made them leave after.” Villanelle stated nonchalantly.   
  
“Always a charmer.” Eve replied sarcastically.  
  
Villanelle hummed again as she remembered those hollow experiences. Those women didn’t really have hair like Eve’s. She thought they had at the time, but now that she had spent five years with Eve and her hair, she knew those imitations paled in comparison.   
  
“Let’s just go for ice cream.” Villanelle said definitively, shaking herself from her thoughts.

 “Ice cream?” Eve queried.  
  
“Yes. Tonight. Let’s just get ice cream. Dinner takes too long.” Villanelle said, grabbing her purse from where she had dumped it on the bed and heading for the hotel room door.  
  
“Oh.” Eve replied. She was taken aback by Villanelle’s lack of desire to do anything memorable. In fact, it seemed she was more intent on making the evening pass quickly.  
  
“If that’s what you want.” Eve said with resignation, following Villanelle to the door.  
  
“Yes. I know a place. It’s just around the corner. They have good vanilla, you’ll like it.” Villanelle assured, not turning around to look at Eve as she said it.   
  
“Vanilla.” Eve repeated. “Sure.”   
  
  
  
Eve had to agree; the vanilla ice cream was good. And it was certainly quick. Villanelle had finished her sorbet so fast that Eve was sure her teeth must be tingling with cold.   
  
“Why did you want to come to Paris?” Villanelle asked, pushing the small bowl that had housed her sorbet away and pointing at Eve with the spoon in her hand.   
  
Eve glanced up at her and swallowed a mouthful of ice cream.  
  
“I thought it would be nice.” Eve replied, “You know, to spend time together.”  
  
Eve knew she had been actively trying to keep Villanelle off the marriage topic for the best part of a week now, and she knew Villanelle wasn’t stupid. Perhaps Eve’s plan hadn’t been well thought out after all. Villanelle didn’t seem quite herself. Eve was catching a strange vibe from her and Paris was apparently doing nothing to quash it.   
  
And there was another problem. Eve had brought Villanelle back to her favourite place, the place she had been the most comfortable, the closest place she’d had to a home, with the intention of asking Villanelle to marry her. But now they were here, Eve realised her plan should have gone a bit further than that. Where was she going to do it? How was she going to do it? She didn’t have rings. The lack of rings was intentional. Eve knew Villanelle well enough to know that choosing that sort of hardware was the kind of task only Villanelle could be trusted with. Villanelle was likely to be quietly furious if Eve attempted that decision herself. The rest of it though, that was a problem. One thing was clear however, this quaint Parisian ice cream parlour, though lovely, was not the place for a proposal. Not with the slightly stormy aura Villanelle was currently shrouded in at least.  
  
“That is all?” Villanelle asked.  
  
Eve must have looked as confused as she felt by that question because Villanelle continued.   
  
“We spend time together at home. Something must have made you think we should come to Paris this weekend, hmm?” Villanelle said shrewdly.  
  
Eve was in trouble, clearly.  
  
“I’m practicing spontaneity?” Eve replied, wincing as her sentence ended in an unintentional question mark. She shoved her last mouthful of ice cream into her mouth and looked away.  
  
Villanelle’s eyebrows lifted doubtfully at that.   
  
“OK.” Villanelle shrugged, seemingly finished with her questioning for now. “You have finished your ice cream? Let’s go to bed. You’re tired.”   
  
“I… It’s nine thirty.” Eve remarked, glancing at her watch.  
  
“I am tired now too.” Villanelle lied with a sudden onslaught of a well-practiced yawn.   
  
“Oh. Right.” Eve replied, unconvinced.  
  
“The vanilla was good?” Villanelle asked, standing from her chair and rounding the table to help Eve back into her discarded jacket.   
  
“It was fine.” Eve supplied stiffly, “I might try something more exciting next time though.”   
  
“Sure baby.” Villanelle laughed and took Eve’s hand in her own. Eve felt a small wave of relief at the gesture if not the words. Villanelle couldn’t be too off with her if she was still holding her hand. Villanelle led her out of the restaurant and onto the streets.  
  
Outside, Villanelle took a deep breath. There had been a brief rain shower while they had been inside and the scent of it hitting the previously dry streets lingered. The air always smelled different here; there was a different energy in it, a higher voltage. Villanelle could hear sirens in the distance and they had a different call to the emergency services in London, they called her back to an earlier time. She thought she missed those Paris days, the freedom and the independence. Those times were the first that she felt totally self-sufficient. She had finally been earning money, good money, and she could do what she wanted with it. Freedom is all well and good, and Villanelle had loved it fiercely. But freedom has a habit of getting lonely, and it did for Villanelle.   
  
Fun job, nice apartment, someone to watch movies with. In the Paris days Villanelle had two out of three. She thought she had the two that mattered most. But even Villanelle was wrong sometimes.   
  
“Are you OK, darling?” Eve asked cautiously, raising her free hand to rub it along Villanelle’s forearm comfortingly.   
  
It was as though Eve could feel Villanelle’s thoughts turning darker sometimes.   
  
“Yes. Just… I have not been here for a while.” Villanelle said.  
  
“Do you not—” Eve started.  
  
“It’s fine. It is nice to be back.” Villanelle assured. And it was nice to be back. Villanelle was being reminded of everything she had now and comparing it to the time when she thought she had everything she needed.  
  
“It is nice to be here with you.” Villanelle added softly.   
  
Eve sighed in relief. There was evidently something going on in Villanelle’s mind, but Eve could make her peace with that as long as Villanelle was still happy to have her there as well.   
  
“Well, good.” Eve said simply and then stopped walking on the cobbled street that shone with the remains of the earlier rain showers. Villanelle felt the tug on her hand stop her in her tracks as Eve halted beside her. Villanelle looked at Eve questioningly.   
  
“Come here,” Eve murmured.   
  
Villanelle took a step back towards Eve with a question in her eyes, but Eve ignored the look and pulled Villanelle into her until they collided.  
  
“What are you doing?” Villanelle laughed.  
  
“You know, you haven’t kissed me since this morning?” Eve asked.  
  
“Well, you seemed too tired to follow me to be bathroom on the train…” Villanelle said slyly.  
  
“Oksana.” Eve warned.  
  
“What? You want to be all romantic and touristy and kiss in the streets of Paris?” Villanelle asked in her Sophie Wilson accent.  
  
“What if I do?” Eve asked with a smile.   
  
“Well, I am not a tourist, but…” Villanelle said, having slipped into a seamless French accent. She leaned in to place a gentle kiss on Eve lips, hoisting the other woman up against her until she was on her tiptoes.   
  
They remained there for a couple of long minutes as the locals skirted around them, completely accustomed to and uninterested in such scenes. When Villanelle finally pulled back and smiled at Eve, Eve felt that some small nugget of normality had been restored between them.   
  
Villanelle captured Eve’s hand once more, tugging her in the direction of the hotel and Eve really hoped she hadn’t just missed the best proposal opportunity she was going to get over the weekend.


	6. Down a Bit

The first morning in Paris Villanelle awoke before Eve. It wasn’t an entirely unheard of occurrence but Eve was almost always the first to wake up out of the two of them. That is, unless something specific had woken Villanelle. A sudden noise was likely to have her lurching from the bed and snatching at the nearest concealed weapon because old habits die hard. One such instance had given Eve quite a shock when she had accidently knocked a book off her nightstand as she attempted to get ready quietly one morning while Villanelle slept. She had picked up the book swiftly from the floor and straightened up to discover a gun in her face.   
  
It was quiet in the hotel room though, with nothing to break the silence but the muted sound of crates being unloaded in the street outside, a delivery for the café across the way. It was a sound familiar to Villanelle from the days of her Paris residency. Villanelle turned to examine the woman next to her. They hadn’t had sex the night before. That was also hardly unheard of, but it felt wrong for a weekend away. Villanelle had, to begin with, wondered when Eve would tire of that aspect of their relationship. Villanelle was aware that she herself had quite a voracious appetite for sex, and she was also aware that Eve and Niko had not. But Eve hadn’t tired of it. Eve gave as good as she got and Villanelle loved her all the more for it.   
  
The previous night though, they had gone to bed and neither had made any move for more than a kiss goodnight. On Villanelle’s part that was because she still couldn’t shift the feeling of discomfort around Eve’s silence on marriage. It was not making Villanelle feel particularly wanted. And that was irrational. Villanelle knew that. Over the past five years, Villanelle had done a great deal of learning about herself and about Eve and how relationships that aren’t based purely on sex and fear are carried out. Villanelle knows now that her reactions to certain situations are out of what would be considered the normal spectrum of response. Eve not wanting to marry her did not mean that Eve did not want her. Villanelle knew that, but telling herself the facts didn’t make her feel any differently about them. Eve had said that she still wanted to be together. It wasn’t Villanelle that Eve didn’t want, it was marriage. But Villanelle’s brain and heart were not on the same wavelength.  
  
“That’s a lot of thinking for this early in the morning.”   
  
Villanelle was roused from her thoughts by Eve’s husky just-woke-up voice. She hadn’t noticed Eve’s eyes hauling themselves open, or the look of concern that they held the moment they were able to focus on the woman in front of them. Villanelle hummed.  
  
“Good morning, baby.” Villanelle whispered.   
  
“Morning Oksana. Want to tell me what’s causing that frown?” Eve asked cautiously.  
  
Villanelle lifted her hand to her forehead and ran a finger along it fretfully.  
  
“We must do some shopping today.” Villanelle said, almost urgently.   
  
“That’s what you’re thinking about? Shopping?” Eve asked with a throaty laugh and Villanelle shrugged.  
  
“I need some face cream. For wrinkles. I don’t want wrinkles.” Villanelle replied forcefully.   
  
Eve laughed. She couldn’t help herself.   
  
“God, I was ten years older than you at least when I started worrying about that.” Eve said in an attempt to lighten the storm clouds gathering behind Villanelle’s eyes.  
  
“Well, I am worried about it now. Do you want me to be shrivelled and wrinkly?” Villanelle asked petulantly.   
  
“I wouldn’t care in the least.” Eve replied, matter of fact.  
  
Villanelle scoffed and rolled onto her back.  
  
“You would.” She said flatly.  
  
“Of course I wouldn’t, don’t be ridiculous.” Eve rolled her eyes with a smile, still fighting to keep the conversation light despite the bite in Villanelle’s statement.  
  
“You wouldn’t mind your beautiful, young lover becoming an old prune?”  Villanelle asked askance.   
  
“Oksana. You’re barely 30. This is not even relevant.” Eve said with finality. But Villanelle was not letting this one go.  
  
“So you will care when I am 50? I will be wrinkly then for sure.” She suggested  
  
“No,” Eve said, dragging out the word, “I won’t care then either.” She couldn’t imagine Villanelle at 50, but that didn’t seem the right thing to say. That odd tension from the evening before was back this morning, and there was a space in the bed between them that didn’t usually exist. The two of them would always be in some kind of physical contact if they were in bed, even if it was just legs touching.  
  
“I think you will care. Maybe that is why you won’t marry me.” Villanelle said, raising her eyebrows daringly but keeping her eyes firmly on the ceiling. She heard Eve exhale an indignant puff of air and then there was no response for a long moment. Villanelle began to regret her statement, but only slightly.  
  
“Is that why you’re being like this?” Eve asked. She was speaking softly but both women were aware that Eve was working hard to keep control of her tone.   
  
Eve had been aware the day before too that Villanelle was purposefully pushing her. Bringing up past conquests, alluding to all the sex she had in her old apartment, Villanelle had been poking Eve with a sharp stick and Eve was not oblivious to it.  
  
“Like what?” Villanelle demanded. She knew exactly what Eve was getting at, but she was in too deep now. She couldn’t take hearing Eve actually tell her why she still hadn’t agreed to marry her, so her only choice was to continue to be childish about it now.   
  
“Argumentative.” Eve said firmly.   
  
“I am not being argumentative.” Villanelle replied in the same tone as Eve.   
  
Eve huffed a humourless laugh.   
  
“Clearly.” She muttered.   
  
“Whatever.” Villanelle let out, flinging the duvet from on top of her and climbing out of the bed. “I am going to take a shower.”   
  
Eve leant up on her elbows and watched Villanelle gather her clothes for the day and her wash bag from the still-packed suitcase at the end of the bed. It was only when Villanelle had closed the bathroom door with a louder bang than necessary that Eve flopped back into her pillows and emitted a frustrated sigh. This was not going to plan at all. Why had she thought this was a good idea in the first place? She should have just gone home that day from work and told Villanelle that yes, she would love to marry her. They could be planning a wedding right now rather than bickering over non-existent wrinkles. Oh God, Eve did not want to plan a wedding. But this bickering was hardly preferable.   
  
Villanelle was being difficult now, and sure, it was not endearing her all that much to Eve, but Eve knew her well enough now to see what was causing Villanelle’s strop. Eve had made her anxious and an anxious Villanelle was a guarded one, a defensive creature prone to fear aggression. She was lashing out in her own small ways in an attempt to dole out the same pain that she was feeling. It was coming out in the form of pointless obstinacy and jabs at Eve’s sensitivities. Villanelle was hurting and Eve had not thought this through.  
  
Eve followed Villanelle’s lead and threw the duvet off of herself. Beneath it she was wearing pyjamas, a fact that, for once, Villanelle had not fought against the night before. Eve stood up from the bed and stretched. She padded over to the large mirror above the hotel dressing table. She ran her hands through her hair and scruffed it up a bit to add extra volume before removing her pyjamas and striding with forced confidence to the bathroom.  
  
Inside the bathroom there was a growing amount of steam. Villanelle favoured an alarmingly hot shower, this Eve already knew. But through the steam and the glass door of the spacious shower stall Eve could make out the flesh coloured shape of Villanelle washing her hair. Eve took a steadying breath. She wasn’t quite sure how her presence in the bathroom would be received this morning. It would be far from the first time she joined Villanelle in the shower, but certainly the first time she would be doing so after a…  a what? A fight? A disagreement? Eve didn’t know how to describe the discourse she was feeling between herself and Villanelle, she just knew that she had to make it alright, to ease Villanelle’s mind, and soothe the inadvertent hurt she had caused. Especially if she was still going to carry out her plan to propose to Villanelle this weekend.  
  
Eve opened the shower door and Villanelle flinched, almost slipping on the base of the cubicle before slapping a hand against the tiled wall to steady herself. She cast a wary look at Eve after she had quashed her surprise at the intrusion and then reached behind her to turn the water temperature down to a level that Eve would be able to stand.   
  
Eve smiled uncertainly at Villanelle, who kept a blank expression, and nodded towards her hand on the temperature gage.  
  
“Thanks.” Eve said softly.  
  
Villanelle shrugged noncommittally as Eve stepped into the shower and Villanelle stepped back to make room, though it was hardly necessary in such a large shower.  
  
“Can I?” Eve asked, taking up the tiny bottle of hotel conditioner tentatively.  
  
“If you want.” Villanelle muttered and turned her back to Eve, tipping her head back under the now less scalding stream of water to wash the residual shampoo from her darkened honey toned hair.  
  
Eve squeezed conditioner from the tiny bottle and rubbed it absentmindedly between her hands. In front of her Villanelle ran her hands through her own hair to push out the last of the suds and then stood silently and waited.   
  
“Down a bit,” Eve requested.  
  
Villanelle bent her knees a little and leaned back. The height difference between them had caused issues in this way before. There was a tried and tested routine now.  
  
“Thank-you.” Eve said, reaching up and running her own fingers through Villanelle’s hair, threading them between the wet strands and distributing the conditioner as evenly as possible.  
  
Villanelle closed her eyes. She had always enjoyed this. The feeling of being cared for in this way was one she had only really received from two people in her lifetime, and one of those had ended up with a bullet in her brain by her own hand.   
  
“We can go shopping after breakfast.” Eve said, rubbing in the conditioner more vigorously.  
  
Villanelle didn’t reply. She was concentrating on keeping her head low enough for Eve to reach and the action required tensing the muscles in her stomach and back. She was focusing also on not letting out any murmurs of approval to suggest how much she adored the sensation of Eve fingers against her scalp.  
  
“And you can get the face cream you wanted.” Eve continued, “You really don’t have wrinkles though, darling. And if you did, or when you do, I won’t care. You are more than just my ‘ _beautiful, young lover_.’ OK?” Eve asked with a gentle tug on Villanelle’s hair to make sure she was listening. She couldn’t help attempting to mimic Villanelle’s accent when she quoted her earlier description of herself. The accent was bad, as always, and Eve had hoped it would make Villanelle smile.  
  
“OK.” Villanelle said simply and there was no trace of a smile in her voice. Villanelle was not rising to the bait of Eve’s bad accents this morning.  
  
Eve waited for a moment or two but Villanelle didn’t say anymore. Eve sighed, and pushed Villanelle forward under the spray of the water again to rinse.  
  
“Do you want to talk about it?” Eve ventured at last, “The marriage thing?”  
  
“You do not want to marry me.” Villanelle replied quickly, pausing briefly to blow water droplets off her lips. “If you did then you would have said so by now. You don’t even let me tell you why I want it.”  
  
And that statement, the honest, wounded, way that it was delivered, kicked Eve in the stomach. Of course that was how Villanelle had seen the past week. Eve had been so wrapped up in her own bright idea, in the image of how thrilled Villanelle would be when she asked her own question, that she hadn’t really considered the impact of that week in between for Villanelle.   
  
“Tell me why you want it.” Eve whispered, pulling her hands from Villanelle’s hair and running them down her slick back as she straightened it and returned to her full height.  
  
There was a pause while Villanelle continued to keep her back to Eve. She was trying to recall her conversation with Irina, but Eve wasn’t to know that. Eve shifted from one foot to the other.  
  
“I want to know we belong with each other.” Villanelle said at last, turning to meet Eve’s eye briefly before looking away and past her left ear. Eve took hold of her hands.   
  
“But you _do_ know that, don’t you?” Eve asked. “I know that.” She added, squeezing Villanelle’s fingers in her own.  
  
“I want it to be… proper. I want everybody else to know. I want people to be able to look at me, and look at you, and know that we belong in a place. There is a place where we are meant to be, with a person we are meant to be with. I want to know that you want it enough to make it… permanent. Want me enough.” Villanelle explained haltingly. Declarations of this sort would never come easy to her and her accent got caught on the words more than Eve had heard it do in quite some time.  
  
Villanelle didn’t want to have to delve too deep and pull out the memories of the looks she had received as a child, ragged and wretched and furious, from well-dressed strangers in the streets. She didn’t want to present as evidence the nomadic existence that had gradually exhausted her and eaten away at any chance of a home before Eve. She didn’t want to explain how it felt to have nobody want her enough to stick around for, or in Anna’s case, leave a husband for. Villanelle wanted Eve to understand, to just want the same thing. She caught Eve’s eye and held it, willing her to see it all without Villanelle having to lay it bare.   
  
And Eve did see it. And she had seen it all along really. And now she was stuck. She couldn’t just agree to the whole thing now in this moment. Villanelle would think she was simply giving in to the pressure and agreeing for an easy life. Eve needed Villanelle to know that Eve _wanted_ it too. That actually, she understood.  
  
“I get it.” Eve said, finding her voice had developed a slight husk to it.  
  
Villanelle narrowed her eyes dubiously.   
  
“You get it?” She asked.  
  
“Yes.” Eve nodded firmly. “I’m not exactly testament to marriage being a permanent state,” Eve added with a wry chuckle, “But with you…”  
  
There was a pause. The storm clouds in Villanelle’s eyes had parted and allowed a beam of sunlight through.  
  
“With me?” Villanelle repeated, taking a step closer.   
  
Eve lifted a hand to Villanelle’s cheek and cupped it gently as Villanelle leaned into her palm and closed her eyes.  
  
“You just have to trust me.” Eve whispered.  
  
Villanelle opened her eyes, a flash of confusion passing over her features.  
  
“What does that mean?” Villanelle asked suspiciously.  
  
“It means that I love you, and I get it, and now you have to trust me.” Eve answered firmly, loosening her other hand from Villanelle’s own and sliding it up the other woman’s arm slowly.  
  
“I do not under—” Villanelle started, lifting her head from Eve’s hand.  
  
“You know,” Eve interrupted, “This is longest we have ever been in a shower together without you trying to fuck me?”   
  
“It is?” Villanelle asked, looking genuinely surprised by Eve’s observation. Eve heaved an internal sigh of relief. There was always one sure-fire way to distract Villanelle.  
  
“Mmhmm.” Eve confirmed, stepping even closer to Villanelle under the stream of the shower and closing the final distance between their bodies.   
  
“Well, we can’t have th—” Villanelle began until Eve placed a finger on her lips, effectively cutting off Villanelle’s words.  
  
“Stop talking now.” Eve said resolutely and a smile stretched beneath the finger Eve held on Villanelle’s lips.  
  
“Ooh. Bossy baby. I like it.” Villanelle smirked, her words muffled by Eve’s finger. Villanelle took Eve’s finger into her mouth and sucked on it gently whilst raising her eyebrows suggestively at Eve.  
  
Eve gulped, feeling a swooping sensation low in her stomach, and blinked water out of her eyes from where it was falling into her slightly upturned face. Villanelle’s height was a hazard sometimes. Eve pulled her finger back from Villanelle’s mouth and watched her pout in response.  
  
“Down a bit.” Eve said, tugging at Villanelle with a hand behind her neck, attempting to pull her in for a kiss.  
  
“Or… Up a bit?” Villanelle asked, scooping Eve into the air before she could respond. Eve wrapped her legs around Villanelle’s hips and allowed herself to be spun around and pressed into the tiled wall of the shower.  
  
“Up… Yeah. Up is good.” Eve gasped as she leant in and finally captured Villanelle’s lips in a kiss.   
  
Villanelle’s kiss was needier than usual, hungrier and more demanding. Eve was struggling to keep up and found herself grateful when Villanelle pulled back momentarily and rested her forehead against Eve’s. They were both breathing heavily and Villanelle was repeatedly leaning back in for sweeping kisses as though she couldn’t face a total lack of contact with Eve’s mouth even as she slid her hand down Eve’s stomach and between her legs.  
  
“I do trust you.” Villanelle panted between kisses.  
  
“Good!” Eve let out in almost a moan as Villanelle’s fingers found what they were looking for. “Just, yeah, just keep doing that.” Eve said brokenly, her fingertips digging into Villanelle’s shoulder blade as she held on for dear life.  
  
Villanelle wasn’t sure if Eve meant that she wanted her to keep doing what she was doing with her fingers, or keep trusting her. But she could manage both.


	7. Breaking and Entering

By the time Eve and Villanelle had finished with their rather lengthy shower (Villanelle had insisted on returning the hair washing favour, even as Eve’s legs threatened to give out beneath her) and left the hotel in search of breakfast it was in fact closer to lunchtime.   
  
“I am starving.” Villanelle complained as she strode along the street in determination.  
  
“Well, _someone_ only wanted ice cream for dinner last night.” Eve pointed out shrewdly as she walked double-time to keep up with Villanelle’s gait.   
  
“And _someone_ wanted a particularly active shower this morning.” Villanelle countered.  
  
“You set that pace and I somehow doubt you’re now as sore as I am.” Eve grumbled. And she wasn’t kidding.  
  
Villanelle halted suddenly and Eve collided with her shoulder.  
  
“I hurt you?” Villanelle asked in concern, her eyes flitting all over Eve’s body as though she may suddenly notice some mortal injury.   
  
“No, no.” Eve assured, “I’m fine, just, you know, it was… rigorous.” Eve decided after a search for an appropriate word.   
  
“Too much?” Villanelle enquired guiltily.   
  
“No!” Eve let out hastily. “No, it was good. Really good.” she promised.   
  
“I had missed you. That is all.” Villanelle said softly. “It did not feel right all week.” She admitted.   
  
“I know, darling. I’m sorry.” Eve replied honestly. “Let’s go find some breakfast. What do you fancy?”  
  
Eve watched as Villanelle momentarily considered a lewd response to that question before catching hold of Eve’s hand and continuing down the street at a gentler pace. Apparently hunger won out over sexual innuendo sometimes.   
  
“ _Croque Madame._ ” Villanelle said with certainty before adding sadly, “Why can’t you get it in London?”  
  
“It’s just a grilled cheese with ham and an egg.” Eve said with a laugh.  
  
“No. It is different here. It is better.” Villanelle replied loftily.   
  
“What isn’t?” Eve asked, dripping with sarcasm.

Villanelle, as she frequently did when not fully concentrating, missed Eve’s tone.   
  
“The public bathrooms.” Villanelle supplied with some authority.  
  
“Oh.” Said Eve.   
  
“Here we are. This is good.” Villanelle let out, pushing her way past chairs, tables and clouds of cigarette smoke on a café terrace and into the building itself. Eve followed closely behind. 

  
  
Later, when Villanelle had eaten a double serving of her beloved _Croque Madame_ and Eve had filled up on pastries and strong black coffee, the couple were back on the streets of Paris.  
  
“Shopping now?” Villanelle asked excitedly.

“Sure. Where’s best to—” Eve started, gazing up at the nearest street sign.   
  
“I know where.” Villanelle stated immediately. “We get the metro round the corner and… oh, I had forgot.”   
  
“Forgot what?” Eve asked curiously.   
  
Villanelle looked uncertain all of a sudden, a kind of bewildered look had overtaken her eyes.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Eve asked, studying Villanelle with mild alarm.   
  
“We are there.” Villanelle said simply.   
  
“Where?” Eve replied, her shoes scuffing against the pavement as she turned and looked around. They were in a street like any other in this arrondissement, familiar only in its overwhelming… Well, French-ness.  
  
“You don’t remember?” Villanelle asked. “Up there?” She pointed up at the building in front of her.  
  
Eve squinted up to where Villanelle was pointing at shuttered windows and cast iron railings on the side of a sandy coloured building. And then she realised.   
  
“Oh. Your old apartment.” Eve said at last.

Villanelle nodded and then seemed to reach some kind of internal conclusion. She grabbed Eve’s hand and took off towards the entrance way to the building.  
  
“Oksana!” Eve let out, “No, we can’t just—”  
  
“It’s OK!” Villanelle insisted, “I just want to go inside. We don’t have to go into the apartment.”  
  
“We’re _not_ going into the apartment because that would be _breaking_ into the apartment.” Eve hissed, throwing a cautious glance over her shoulder as Villanelle dragged her up the steps and into the building.  
  
The wide stairs were the same. The post boxes on the wall and the monochrome tiled floors, it was all the same. Eve was reminded of that time when she had abandoned her homeward flight from Moscow and ended up here instead. She could recall the thronging anticipation and palpitating fear she had felt climbing those stairs. It had been like creeping into a lion’s den. And then she remembered her journey back down them, following a trail of crimson and smeared handprints on the wall. The sick guilt in her stomach and the blank buzzing of disbelief at her own actions. It came back as Eve stood frozen in the hallway.  
  
“We should go.” Eve uttered, swallowing a ghost of the bile she had tasted that day.  
  
“Let me just…” Villanelle replied, and stepped up the first couple of stairs, trailing the tips of her fingers on the wooden handrail, worn smooth by at least a century of hands.  
  
Villanelle recalled flitting up these stairs laden with shopping bags from the nicest stores in Paris. She had stumbled up them, attached at the mouth to attractive women and men she had picked up in bars or at the theatre. She had traipsed up them as she flicked through her post, all addressed to different  names, in the hope of a postcard, a job to do. She had barely given this staircase a moment’s thought back then, now it seemed a recurring character in so many of her recollections. Villanelle had loved that life. She hadn’t known any better then.  
  
“Oksana!” Eve called as quietly as she could.   
  
“One minute.” Villanelle replied distractedly, turning the corner of the staircase and disappearing out of sight.   
  
The building smelled the same, slightly dusty and a little bit damp, but with wafts of perfume loitering in the air. Villanelle could identify one scent in particular, heavy and with lavender tones. Madame Tattevin must still live here. Villanelle hadn’t thought about the old crone for years.  
  
Eve glanced over her shoulder and then hurried up the stairs after Villanelle. When she reached the top, Villanelle was standing rooted to the spot in front of the door to her old apartment.   
  
“OK.” Eve said, panting a little from the hasty climb, “We came, we saw. Can we  _please_ go now?”  
  
“It is for sale.” Villanelle said blankly, flicking at a slip of paper pinned to the double wooden doors.  
  
“Great. I hope its next owners are very happy here, but we—” Eve started.  
  
Villanelle stepped forward and rattled the handle.  
  
“What are you— No! Oksana!” Eve exclaimed.  
  
Villanelle stepped back and Eve relaxed until Villanelle pulled the door sharply towards herself.  
  
“We agreed!” Eve hissed, “No—”  
  
Villanelle shoved the door forward again and turned the handle just right as she did so. The door opened with a clatter.  
  
“…Breaking and entering.” Eve finished with a sigh.   
  
“It was barely even locked.” Villanelle shrugged, stepping inside the apartment.   
  
“It _was_ locked though.” Eve grumbled, throwing another cursory look down the stairs behind her. Her gaze lingered on the door to Madame Tattevin’s apartment and the peephole that she knew was probably still there.   
  
Eve shuffled into the apartment after Villanelle and pulled the door closed quietly behind her. A wide open door that should be locked would be the first giveaway to other residents that there had been a… break in.   
  
Villanelle was standing in what had been the large kitchen dining area. It was almost entirely empty. Eve approached her quietly and wrapped her arm around Villanelle’s waist. That lost look was back again.   
  
“At least they got rid of that refrigerator.” Eve mumbled, “That thing must have been older than you.”  
  
“It worked fine.” Villanelle replied vaguely and then, “It’s all gone.” She said quietly.  
  
“Well, darling,” Eve started, reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind Villanelle’s ear, “Things move on. People move on. You’ve moved on… haven’t you?”  
  
“Yes.” Villanelle nodded. “It is… strange though. I thought I was happy here.”   
  
Eve let those words mull for a moment. It was an odd statement.   
  
“You were happy here, weren’t you?” Eve replied.  
  
Villanelle stepped away from Eve and wondered over to the door into the bedroom.  
  
“It was good.” Villanelle agreed, “For a time. But I am happier now. I thought I had nearly everything I wanted then. But the bit that was missing was actually the best bit, you know?” she asked, wondering over to the window of the bedroom and peering out and then down at the street.  
  
“I… Yes?” Eve tried. She thought she knew what Villanelle was getting at but didn’t want to assume.   
  
“I am talking about you, Eve.” Villanelle replied bluntly, turning away from the window and watching Eve instead.  
  
“I thought so.” Eve admitted. “So… you don’t miss it?” Eve checked.  
  
“No.” Villanelle replied, more quickly and firmly than Eve had been expecting.   
  
“Let’s see if they changed the bathroom.” Villanelle murmured and strode past Eve towards the other room.   
  
Eve readied herself for Villanelle to be disappointed.  
  
“Ha!” Came an exclamation from beyond the bathroom door. “They didn’t! I told you nobody would change this bathroom.”  
  
Eve followed the sound of Villanelle’s voice and found her looking elated in what remained a hideous bathroom, as far as Eve was concerned.   
  
“We should try and get taps like these.” Villanelle decided, and Eve watched as she rubbed one of the golden fish taps fondly.  
  
And that was when Eve felt an alarming sense of readiness.  
  
“Oksana.” Eve said, swallowing a lump in her throat once the name had left it.  
  
“Don’t you think, baby? They’re probably expensive but so worth it. Beautiful.” Villanelle rambled on, still admiring the garish faucet.   
  
“Oksana, I want to say something.” Eve tried again, willing her voice to stay steady.  
  
“Yes, you want to leave. I know. Just a minute, I still want to check for the cash under the sink.” Villanelle replied, turning towards the sink in question until Eve caught her by the sleeve and stopped her mid-pivot.   
  
“No. Shut up.” Eve said in a rush. She needed to do this now.  
  
“So bossy today!” Villanelle replied with an impressed smirk and a tone that implied she wasn’t opposed to this side of Eve.  
  
“Oksana!” Eve snapped.  
  
“OK, OK.” Villanelle relented. “What do you want to say?”  
  
Eve gulped and grabbed Villanelle’s other hand. She opened and closed her mouth a few times until Villanelle’s look of focused attention turned to concern.  
  
“Baby, what is—”  
  
“I want to marry you.” Eve burst out, and then closed her eyes and shook her head reproachfully at herself.

“I mean, I think we should get married.” Eve tried again, “Or… No. I meant, will you marry me?” She finished quietly, looking up at Villanelle with wide eyes.   
  
Villanelle stared back, her catlike eyes as wide as Eve’s. And Eve watched as they filled with tears. She watched as Villanelle’s body sagged in relief even though Eve hadn’t been aware of the tension in it just moments before. Villanelle sniffed and then an unrivalled smile took over her lips.  
  
“Eve!” Villanelle laughed, jostling Eve’s hands in her own affectionately. “You cannot ask!”  
  
“I can.” Eve replied, mildly offended. “I did ask. I just asked.”  
  
“No. I already asked. You cannot ask.” Villanelle said assuredly.  
  
“Well, I… Does it matter?” Eve asked. This wasn’t the conversation she had expected them to have following her, albeit garbled, proposal.   
  
Villanelle appeared to consider the question for a moment before hauling Eve towards her and wrapping her arms around her, lifting her into the air and burying her face in the crook of Eve’s neck.   
  
“It does not matter.” Came the mumbled response, muffled by Eve’s neck and hair. “You know I will marry you.”  
  
Eve huffed out a laugh and felt tears spring to her own eyes.  
  
“Thank God.” Eve groaned.  
  
Villanelle pulled back and looked at Eve, her expression was one of astonishment and pure earnestness.   
  
“You really want to?” Villanelle asked.  
  
“God, yes!” Eve assured her, pulling Villanelle’s face in towards her by the cheeks before landing a rushed a sloppy kiss on her lips. Villanelle laughed into the kiss.  
  
“I knew a week ago. I wanted to do something romantic, you know, I wanted to bring you here to tell you.” Eve said, pulling back only enough that her lips were still brushing Villanelle’s as she spoke. Then she retreated a bit further, “Well, not _here_ here.” She added, “Trespassing wasn’t part of my romantic plan.”  
  
Villanelle laughed again and leaned in for another kiss, she couldn’t wipe the smile from her lips and they were in danger of clashing teeth.   
  
“You should have told me already,” Villanelle said into Eve’s mouth, “I thought you didn’t want me.”  
  
Eve felt a stab of guilt even as Villanelle chased her lips once more.  
  
“That will never be true.” Eve said, evading Villanelle’s lips to look her in the eye as she spoke. Eve needed Villanelle to see the truth behind those words.  
  
“OK.” Villanelle replied, seemingly satisfied with that, and then she narrowed her eyes, “You did not choose rings did you? Because I—”  
  
“No.” Eve cut in hurriedly, “I thought you should do that.”  
  
“Oh good.” Villanelle breathed.  
  
“My taste isn’t that bad, you know, I mean—” Eve was interrupted by the sound of a door closing in the apartment, followed by voices.  
  
Eve’s eyes widened in alarm.  
  
“Shit!” Eve gasped, sliding back down Villanelle’s body until her feet hit the floor again. “Oksana, what are we—” Eve whispered in a panic.  
  
“Ssshhh!” Villanelle replied, pulling Eve closer to her as though she thought she might have to physically restrain her to keep her quiet.   
  
They stood for a moment and listened to the voices. A pair of voices, speaking French, and footsteps echoing through the empty apartment as they trod over the bare parquet floors of the living area.  
  
Eve was trembling. They really didn’t need to be arrested for breaking and entering. This would not look good for either of them. Elena would never stop laughing if Eve told her this story. Oh God.  
  
“It is the estate agent.” Villanelle whispered, clearly having deciphered the muffled French words.  
  
“Oh God.” Eve mumbled, looking around the room for any possible escape route, as though a passageway might appear between the sickly pink tiles.

“Oh God. Oh God.” Eve repeated, stuck in a fearful mantra.  
  
“Eve!” Villanelle hissed. “It is fine.”  
  
“How?” Eve whispered back harshly, “How is it fine? It is anything but fine!”  
  
“Follow me.” Villanelle said, speaking at a usual volume now. Eve’s eyes were now wider than she had thought humanly possible.   
  
“What? Oksana, no!” She exclaimed, pulling Villanelle’s arm and trying to stop her from walking out of the bathroom.   
  
“Don’t speak.” Villanelle said firmly, then shook her arm free of Eve’s grasp and stepped confidently out of the bathroom.  
  
“Oh God.” Eve croaked.  
  
Just stepping into the bedroom as Villanelle and Eve re-entered it from the bathroom was a man dressed in a navy blue suit and winkle-picker shoes, evidently an estate agent, along with an effortlessly smart looking woman in a blazer and tight jeans. Both looked stunned at the appearance of two strangers from the bathroom.  
  
“ _Ah, pardon_!” Villanelle crooned as she stepped confidently towards the other occupants of the room. “ _Je n’avais pas realise que quelqu’un d’autre venait._ ”  
  
Eve could hear her own heartbeat. She knew her eyes must be darting wildly between Villanelle and the confused looking estate agent. Villanelle cast Eve a warning look and Eve tried to play along, despite having no idea what Villanelle was saying.  
  
“ _Vous êtes_?” Asked the estate agent.   
  
And Eve understood that much. _Who are you?_ Oh God. Oh God.   
  
“ _Désolé!_ ” Villanelle breezed stepping even closer to the man, “ _Marie,”_ she added, tapping a hand to her chest, “ _Premier jour._ ” She said, plastering her face with an exaggerated look of apprehension and then laughing lightly.  
  
“ _Ah. Je vois, mais—_ ” The man started, but Villanelle turned her attention to the woman by his side and placed a hand on her forearm.   
  
“ _C’est exquisite, non?_ ” she asked, gesturing at the apartment around them.  
  
The woman looked mostly perturbed by Villanelle’s presence, but nodded noncommittally anyway.  
  
The estate agent cleared his throat and looked at Eve apologetically.  
  
“Et vous? Aimez-vous?” He aimed at Eve.  
  
Eve shot a panicked look towards Villanelle, who wasn’t looking her way but gave an almost imperceptible nod.   
  
“Uh… oui?” Eve replied in a definite American accent.  
  
Out of the corner of her eye Eve saw Villanelle cringe.  
  
“OK!” Villanelle let out, beaming widely and returning to Eve’s said, “ _Es-tu prêt_?” She asked Eve, thankfully leaving no room for her to respond before adding, “ _Bon! Allons.”_  
  
Eve allowed herself to be steered towards the front door of the apartment, her body submitting all control to Villanelle’s guiding arm. But then the arm vanished and Eve stopped dead, turning to look questioningly at Villanelle.  
  
“ _Un instant, s’il vous plait._ ” Villanelle called out, raising one finger to the estate agent and his client, who continued to watch her blankly.   
  
Villanelle crossed back across the apartment, her steps almost thunderously loud in the silence, and disappeared into the bathroom. Eve smiled politely at the strangers and hoped to God they didn’t ask her any questions. Seconds later Villanelle reappeared, held up her phone as though it had been left in the bathroom and rolled her eyes at herself. Eve knew for a fact that the phone had been in Villanelle’s pocket the entire time.  
  
“ _Maintenant, allons-y!_ ” Villanelle said with a tone of authority, her hand back in its guiding position on the small of Eve’s back. And then, over her shoulder she called, “ _Désolé encore pour le derangement. À bientôt!_ ”  
  
Eve remained silent all the way down the stairs and out of the apartment building until she leant back against the wall of it once they were safely outside and brought her hands up to rake through her hair. Her heart was still thrumming manically in her chest.   
  
“Jesus Christ!” Eve exclaimed, keeping her hands in her hair but shaking her head repeatedly.  
  
“Did you just pretend to be an estate agent?” Eve demanded.  
  
“ _Mais oui,_ ” Villanelle replied with a flirtatious shrug.  
  
Eve simply gaped at her.   
  
Beside her Villanelle whooped joyfully as Eve looked on in despair.   
  
“You enjoyed that, didn’t you? You actually fucking enjoyed that.” Eve seethed.  
  
“It was fun! Like the old days!” Villanelle exclaimed, a thrilled expression on her face.   
  
“I thought I was going to have a heart attack.” Eve growled.  
  
“But you did not.” Villanelle pointed out needlessly.   
  
Eve threw her head back against the wall and groaned.   
  
“And… Look what I got!” Villanelle called out, coming to stand toe-to-toe with Eve and brandishing a thick wad of euro notes and then cackling ecstatically.   
  
“Seriously?” Eve asked in disbelief. “That is what you risked staying longer for?”  
  
“I didn’t want that man in the shit suit to find it.” Villanelle replied indignantly.   
  
“Oh my God.” Eve muttered, shaking her head in defeat and pushing herself away from the wall, “I need a drink. Is it too early for a drink? Actually, we’re on holiday, I don’t care.” She said, mostly to herself.  
  
“And also, baby,” Villanelle said softly, catching up to where Eve had started walking blindly away down the street in the hopes she was heading to somewhere that served alcohol.  
  
“Yes?” Eve asked as Villanelle slung an arm around her shoulders.  
  
“We are getting married.” Villanelle whispered into her ear.  
  
Eve smiled at that, despite everything.   
  
“Yes we are.” She agreed.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think that this is the end of this particular story, there's probably a couple more chapters. But this is the end for a bit because it's all I've got and there's no time to write more for little while. I thought you would rather have this and then wait. 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed it. Comments are crack.


	8. Blood Money

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank-you for your patience.

It had taken some time for Eve’s heart rate to return to normal after herself and Villanelle had made a hasty retreat from the vicinity of Villanelle’s old apartment building. Eve had continued to cast wary looks over her shoulder, her body wracked with excess adrenaline coursing desperately through her veins and so Villanelle had taken charge of the situation and led the pair of them to a bar a few streets away. She had deposited Eve at an outside table on the terrace and disappeared inside with abject determination before returning moments later with an obviously anxious waiter in tow.  
  
“What would you like, Madame?” The waiter in the starched white shirt and spotless black trousers had asked Eve in faltering English.  
  
Eve looked up at him in momentary confusion, her mind still processing the events that had occurred in Villanelle’s old address.  
  
“Champagne.” Villanelle almost barked, pulling out the chair beside Eve and sitting down before gesturing for the waiter to hurry up and leave.  
  
“OK, baby?” Villanelle asked gently, catching a hold of Eve’s hand from the table and pulling it into her lap.

 “Yeah, sure. Anything alcoholic.” Eve muttered.

 The cigarette smoke wafting towards them from an elderly woman drinking coffee with a Daschund on her lap was smelling intensely inviting to Eve. She hadn’t had a single cigarette for nearly two years now, but occasionally, when her stress levels peaked, she really craved one. Right now, for example, she would be willing to use her wholly inadequate French to bum a _Gauloises_ from the woman across the terrace.

“I meant are _you_ OK.” Villanelle explained with a confused expression, “You do not seem as happy as me.”  
  
“We just broke into an apartment, imitated an estate agent and stole a stack of euros.” Eve intoned monotonously.

 Villanelle laughed gleefully.  
  
“Actually baby, _I_ did all of those things. And it was not stealing, I earned these euros for slitting the throat of a Croatian football manager.” Villanelle pointed out proudly as she patted the breast pocket of her jacket that was bulging with large denomination notes. “But it was fun having you with me.” Villanelle added sincerely, stroking her thumb over the back of Eve’s hand affectionately.  
  
“Mmm, I think we probably would have _both_ been arrested for burglary.” Eve replied sardonically.  
  
Villanelle appeared to consider that for a moment and then offered a one-shouldered shrug.

“Neither of us were arrested.” She said lightly as the waiter reappeared with a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket and two glasses. The waiter glanced apprehensively at Villanelle, obviously having heard her words, and then stood to attention at the side of the table, awaiting any other requests as he had evidently been trained to do.  
  
The waiter remained in place as Villanelle reached for the champagne bottle and then seemed to notice him, turning her gaze on him almost predatorily. Villanelle had a habit of sensing weakness and playing with it, like a house cat and a half-eaten mouse.  
  
“ _Merci._ ” Eve said quickly before Villanelle could decide to tease the obviously insecure man.  
  
The waiter nodded gratefully and then strode back inside the bar.

“ _And_ we just got engaged.” Villanelle added as though there had been no interruption from the waiter at all. Eve simply nodded. Villanelle was right. They had just got engaged.  
  
“OK,” Villanelle said decisively, plucking the champagne bottle from its silver bucket and pouring two generous glasses, ignoring the large icy water droplets as they soaked into the white tablecloth.  
  
“For you.” Villanelle handed a glass to Eve, and then held her own in the air. “And to us.”

Eve felt the tension of the incident at the apartment begin to fade away as she assessed the look of pure contentment on Villanelle’s face. Eve had made the right decision. Life with Villanelle could never become dull. Eve raised her glass.  
  
“To not getting arrested, but getting married instead.” Eve said with a smile and clinked her glass against Villanelle’s carefully.  
  
Villanelle let out a bark of laughter.  
  
“I like that!” She crowed before taking a generous sip of her champagne. Eve watched her for another moment before doing the same and feeling the harsh bubbles of the lightly golden liquid chasing away the lump that had formed in her throat.  
  
Villanelle placed her glass down on the table and leaned back in her chair in satisfaction.  
  
“How soon can we do it?” Villanelle asked expectantly.  
  
Eve swallowed an unintentional second mouthful of champagne that made her eyes water slightly.  
  
“How soon can we get married?” Eve asked, croaking a bit around the bubbles that now seemed lodged in her windpipe.

“Yes.” Villanelle nodded as though it was obvious.

“Well, weddings take a while to plan…” Eve started, “You have to pick a date, find a venue, invite people, choose meals and flowers and music and—”

“What?” Villanelle interrupted with a look verging on disgust overtaking her features.  
  
“Weddings don’t just come together on their own.” Eve replied nonplussed.

“No, no. I do not want any of that shit.” Villanelle assured quickly, “I don’t want flowers and food and other people.”

“You don’t want a wedding?” Eve asked slowly.

“No.” Villanelle replied firmly.

“You just want to get married?” Eve checked.

“Yes. I just want to marry you.” Villanelle said with complete certainty and then paused and looked a little guilty, “Do you want all that stuff?”

 Eve’s eyes must have widened as she took in this new development to the seemingly never-ending saga of this fresh step in their relationship.

“We can!” Villanelle let out emphatically, obviously misreading Eve’s silence. She grabbed at Eve’s hand again and took it in both of her own. “We can do the flowers and invite your family and friends and… Do you want a dress? Do you want dresses for both of us?” she said in a hurry.

Eve couldn’t stop the laughter that was bubbling up, and it might have been caused by the champagne hitting her barely lined stomach (pastries don’t soak up a huge amount) or it could be the sheer ridiculousness that her life had become at the age of 52. This is not where she ever thought she would be. It was insane and it was wonderful, and she wouldn’t change it.

“Now you are laughing,” Villanelle said flatly. “Why are you laughing?”

“I’m sorry, darling.” Eve managed between her chuckling, “I’m not laughing at you. I’m just laughing at… I don’t know. I’m just laughing. I’m happy I guess.” She finished with a smile and a shrug, adding her free hand to where Villanelle had her other hand clasped between her own two.

Villanelle looked relieved but still confused.

“So you don’t want the wedding? Or you do want the wedding?” Villanelle asked cautiously, cocking her head to one side and then the other as she listed the only two options.

Eve gave their pile of hands a gentle shake.

“I just want you.” She said, “I have done the wedding bit before. It’s not what matters.”

“Oh. That is good.” Villanelle sighed and pulled a hand free to take hold of her champagne glass again and took another affirming glug as Eve followed suit.  
  
“I did think you would want a party though.” Eve mused aloud.

“We can have a party whenever.” Villanelle replied with a dismissive shake of her head, “Do the party when we are married, or don’t. It doesn’t matter.”  
  
Eve raised her eyebrows. Villanelle was surprising her yet again. And why had she _still_ not learnt to expect the unexpected when it came Oksana Astankova?

“So how soon can we do it?” Villanelle repeated, breaking into Eve’s thoughts.

This time Eve didn’t choke on her champagne and instead considered the question.

“I don’t know really. I guess we just have to get a booking at the registry office and that will probably take a month or so—”

“A month?” Villanelle cut in, aghast. “That is ages. I thought we could just do it while we are here.” She said, disappointment clear in her voice.

“Oh, I mean, we could come back and do it here if you want?” Eve asked gently.

“No, let’s just do it at home whenever is the soonest we can.” Villanelle said.

“I…OK.” Eve agreed.

“But we can get rings here!” Villanelle exclaimed as the thought occurred to her.

“Sure,” Eve smiled, “That we can do today.”

“And I will choose for both of us.” Villanelle added carefully.

“I don’t know why you think my taste in jewellery is so bad.” Eve muttered, finishing off her glass of champagne and reaching for the bottle.

“Because you have ugly jewellery.” Villanelle replied simply.

“Niko bought most of that!” Eve defended and Villanelle scoffed. If she thought that was true then she might have been mildly jealous that Eve had kept so many gifts from her ex-husband, but Villanelle knew better.

“Not all of it…” Villanelle said teasingly, “That bracelet with the heart thing on it.”

“I like that bracelet.” Eve said quietly, topping up Villanelle’s unfinished glass.

“I will choose the rings.” Villanelle repeated firmly.

  
  
  
An hour or so later found the couple in one of the fanciest stores Eve had ever set foot in. When she had got dressed this morning, she had not expected to find herself here. If she had, then she may have worn something other than hound’s-tooth cropped trousers and a camel coloured coat. Her discomfort was not aided by the fact that Villanelle had had the waiter at the bar stick a cork back in their unfinished champagne bottle and Eve was now trying to hold it surreptitiously at her side whilst idling around a high end Parisian jewellers.

Villanelle, of course, looked right at home here. She was conversing with the pursed-lipped attendant in flawless French whilst laughing attractively and asking what were evidently the pertinent questions.

Eve had been distractedly perusing a case of glinting diamonds in various ring settings and dejectedly thinking that her taste in jewellery was _perfectly acceptable_ , and then wondering if perhaps that champagne had really gone to her heard, she had drank most of that half a bottle herself… then Villanelle had appeared at her side and corralled her over to a side room. There, after Eve had deposited the champagne bottle between her feet with an embarrassing clunk, the hawk-eyed attendant measured Eve’s ring finger before announcing her size.

“Ha!” Villanelle exclaimed, “That is exactly what I guessed,” she whispered conspiratorially to Eve with a gentle shoulder check.

Eve was unmistakably supposed to be impressed by the prediction, so she raised her eyebrows at Villanelle and nodded indulgently.

“OK. You can go now, baby.” Villanelle said, putting her hands on both of Eve’s shoulders and steering her towards the store’s entrance, where another attendant rushed to open the door for her.

“Wait. What? Are we not choosing them together?” Eve asked, trying and failing to halt Villanelle’s persuasive shoving towards the door.

“Nope!” Villanelle said with a smile. “You can go back to the hotel. Take a bath or something.”

“You can trust us.” The attendant said in heavily accented English. “Your partner has exquisite taste, Mrs…”

And then there was an awkward pause where a surname was clearly meant to go. Eve flashed a worried glance at Villanelle, who simply raised a singular eyebrow at her and smirked daringly.

Eve cleared her throat and squared her shoulders.  
  
“Wilson.” She said decisively.

And she could have stayed and watched that wide smile on Villanelle’s face all day, but by now she really needed to pee, and Villanelle evidently wanted her chosen rings to be a surprise, so Eve managed to put one foot in front of the other and left the store like someone who wasn’t dragging a cumbersome, half-empty, champagne bottle along with her.

Jesus. Day drinking really did affect Eve. She had just decided to change her name on a total whim.  

Eve spent her entire walk back to their hotel mulling it over. Eve Astankova definitely had a better ring to it, but Eve could hardly take that name. It would look a little suspicious at work if Eve Polastri married her co-worker Sophie Wilson (who was _definitely not_ a former Russian assassin) and ended up as Eve Astankova. So Wilson would have to do. Villanelle seemed happy enough with it. She seemed ecstatic actually, and that thought warmed Eve even more effectively than the swig of champagne she took straight from the bottle as she sat at the end of the hotel bed and waited for Villanelle’s return.

  
  
  
Eve had already wondered just how long it took to pick two rings, and graduated onto wondering whether Villanelle had become distracted by other stores en route back to the hotel, when the sound of a key card entering the lock infiltrated the hotel room.

“There you are,” Eve let out as Villanelle slipped into the room, pushing the door closed behind her with a click.

“How did you get on?” Eve asked, “Did they have what you wanted?”

Villanelle didn’t reply, but placed a cream coloured thick card bag with cream ribbon handles down on the desk and then advanced on Eve, with a hungry look in her eye. Eve almost took a step backwards before Villanelle reached her and wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling Eve firmly towards her and then looping the other arm around her shoulder and pushing her fingers into Eve’s hair at the top of her neck. Eve swallowed thickly.

“You said Wilson.” Villanelle almost growled.

Oh. Now Eve understood. She looped both of her arms up over Villanelle’s shoulders and smiled at her knowingly.

“I did.” Eve said. Villanelle exhaled shakily, her eyes flashing with something Eve couldn’t quite decipher.

“Did you mean it?” Villanelle asked quietly and Eve pretended to contemplate the question before grinning at Villanelle.

“Only because Astankova would raise too many questions.” Eve replied honestly.

And this time Villanelle did growl as she captured Eve’s lips with her own, even as Eve smiled into the kiss. Villanelle kept her attentions focused on Eve’s mouth for quite some time, as her fingers raked through Eve’s hair and her other hand kept its pressure on Eve’s hips, keeping her firmly against Villanelle. And Eve was certainly not complaining.

This day could not be more different from the last time she got engaged, Eve realised as Villanelle pulled away but stayed close enough that she could rest her forehead against Eve’s and Eve could feel her warm breath on her own moistened lips.

“Today has made me very happy, Eve.” Villanelle said sincerely.

“God, me too.” Eve sighed, leaning up slightly so she could brush another kiss against Villanelle’s lips.

“I cannot wait to be married to you.” Villanelle uttered. “We will call the registry office soon, yes?”

Eve laughed.

“As soon as we get home.” Eve promised and Villanelle let out a slow breath and her lips chased Eve’s once more and then she pulled back abruptly.

“Are you still sore from this morning?” Villanelle asked curiously.

Eve huffed out a laugh at that. She hadn’t thought about the soreness in a while now. The excitement of the day, the engagement, the law-breaking, and possibly the champagne, had chased away any lingering discomfort between her legs from the morning’s shower escapades.

“No darling, I don’t think so.” Eve chuckled as she watched Villanelle’s eyes widen in relief.

“Because we are in Paris and we just got engaged, so we should definitely fuck. Like, a lot.” Villanelle nodded as she spoke and kept her still widened eyes on Eve, who couldn’t control the affectionate smile that spread across her mouth.

“Oh, I agree.” Eve said in as serious a tone as she could manage. “Do I get to see these rings first though?”  
  
At once Villanelle released Eve and took a couple of long strides back to the desk at the side of the room and grabbed the bag before returning and perching at the end of the bed. Eve mimicked her pose and sat beside her. Along with the cream coloured ribbon handles, the bag was fastened with another ribbon, which Villanelle worked loose. Inside the bag was cream crepe paper, which Villanelle pulled from the bag to find a box, clearly too big to be a ring box. Inside that box was… more crepe paper, and another box.

“Seriously?” Eve asked, pushing crepe paper to the floor impatiently.  
  
Villanelle shushed her and opened the second box, inside which was two smaller boxes, this time they were definitely ring boxes. Villanelle held one up to her face and opened it a crack to peer inside, then switched it for the other.  
  
“OK. This one is yours.” Villanelle stated, “Finger, please.” She added, holding out her hand, palm up.

Eve decided it wasn’t the time to make a crude joke, so she placed her left hand in Villanelle’s and allowed her to slide the ring onto the relevant finger.

And Villanelle had chosen well. The ring was simple and elegant with a thin white gold band and a single perfectly cut diamond, not too ostentatious in size, but large enough to draw attention. Eve felt her breath catch as she assessed the ring that looked entirely at home on the finger that had been bare for years now.

“You like it? It’s OK?” Villanelle asked with an undertone of anxiety in her voice.

“Of course I like it, Oksana.” Eve reassured, “It is just right.”

Villanelle beamed and leant into the kiss that Eve pressed against her lips.

“And yours?” Eve asked.

“It is the same.” Villanelle replied and Eve was surprised.

“You didn’t want something… flashier?”

“I wanted the same as you.” Villanelle said firmly.

“Want me to put it on you?” Eve enquired, and Villanelle passed her the second box and held out her hand patiently as Eve slipped the ring onto her finger.

Villanelle stared at her hand for what felt like a long time to Eve. There was doubtlessly a lot going on in Villanelle’s mind and Eve chose to let her work through it quietly as she seemed to need to do.

Eventually Villanelle looked up again and smiled broadly at Eve.

“See?” Villanelle said, “It is good that we went to the apartment and got that money.”

Eve’s mouth dropped open.

“You bought the rings with that?” She asked astounded and Villanelle nodded innocently.

“They were shocked when I paid with cash.” Villanelle admitted.

“You bought our engagement rings with cash from killing a Croatian soccer manager?” Eve let out slowly.

“So? Money is money.” Villanelle shrugged, “I bought our wedding rings too.” and she pulled yet another box from inside the jeweller’s bag and tucked it behind her back, out of Eve’s reach.

Eve let out a dismayed gargle at that.

“What is the problem?” Villanelle asked openly.

“You bought our wedding rings with… blood money.” Eve muttered and Villanelle laughed.

“Blood money! Nobody calls it that, baby.” She said, shaking her head in amusement.

“Fine. But you… It’s money from…” Eve started and then stopped herself. She was marrying the ex-assassin she was once assigned to track and locate, after all. If their rings were bought with money from a kill, then so be it. 

“No, you know what? That is kind of fitting actually.” Eve decided.

“Exactly.” Villanelle nodded emphatically.

Villanelle wasn’t sure what was fitting about it, but Eve didn’t seem to be annoyed now, so Villanelle was happy to agree with whatever conclusion Eve had reached. Plus, there were rings on both of their fingers and nothing else was important.


	9. Stale Bread

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one jumps around a bit. I hope it's not confusing.

For the most part, life was as they had left it when Eve and Villanelle returned from their weekend in Paris. Eve had stayed true to her word and first thing Monday morning she had called the registry office and made a booking. She had been told that there was a minimum of a 28-day waiting period, but that the first available slot to register a marriage wasn’t until almost a month after that. Unsurprisingly, Villanelle had been thoroughly unimpressed with that piece of information when Eve had relayed it to her. And ‘thoroughly unimpressed’ was putting it lightly. Eve had requested that she be informed immediately of any cancellations prior to their booking, but she hadn’t told Villanelle that for fear of getting her hopes up.

And so life returned to their personal version of normal. With no actual wedding to plan, there was nothing to do but wait. As it turned out, neither Eve nor Villanelle was very good at waiting.

Eve continued to get a bolt of excitement down her spine whenever the light caught the ring on her finger. She found herself fiddling with it contentedly throughout the day in a way she never remembered doing with its predecessor. And of course, it had taken all of 15 seconds for Elena to clock the new rock on Eve.

Elena had popped by on Monday morning to ask how Paris had been and had barely sat down in the chair opposite Eve before she was leaping to her feet again and grabbing Eve’s hand across the table.

“Babe!” Elena squealed and then paused, “There is no way you got engaged and didn’t tell me,” she said threateningly, “Because that would be rude.”

“Uh…” Eve started, tugging her hand back gently.

“Babe! Not cool.” Elena said with a disapproving shake of her head. “But fine. Go on then, how did she do it? Was she going down on you again? Or did she just drop to one knee this time?”

“Very funny.” Eve replied monotonously and Elena laughed happily at her own joke. There was a pause as Elena waited for Eve to tell her story, but Eve remained quiet. Once again she was faced with a slightly unconventional scenario to describe.

“So? How did she do it this time? You’re not actually going to make me guess, are you?” Elena let out exasperated.

“I did it.” Eve said simply, trying to quash the proud smile that was threatening the edges of her lips.

“Shut up. No you didn’t.” Elena replied dismissively.

“I did!” Eve exclaimed, losing all sense of decorum, “Why is that so hard to believe?” She asked in a tone of mild hurt.

“Oh, I dunno, maybe because you were all, ‘She’s too young. She just wants a party. Marriage will be boring for her. We don’t even _need_ to get married.’” Elena suggested, lowering her voice and making it gravelly in a poor imitation of Eve’s own.

“OK, wow. I do not sound like that.” Eve replied blankly.

“You do. Your voice is sort of husky. It’s sexy.” Elena insisted.

Eve furrowed her eyebrows in surprised confusion at that insight and then shook her head.

“Right,” she drawled, “Let’s not examine that too closely, OK? And maybe don’t say it to Oksana.”

“Obvs.” Elena agreed.

“But God, I did say those things, didn’t I?” Eve let out on a sigh.

“Yep.” Smiled Elena.

“I was such a dick.” Eve enthused.

“Yep.” Elena repeated.

“Gee, thanks.” Eve replied with a huff.

“But whatever. So you did it? You asked Villanelle to marry you?” Elena prompted.

“I did.” Eve nodded, a genuine smile widening her lips. She couldn’t help it.

“Ahhhh,” Elena cooed, and Eve felt her cheeks get a little warm with embarrassment. This kind of lovesick chit-chat wasn’t her usual M.O. She had gone from being boringly married, to hiding her relationship with a fugitive killer, to this… happily engaged and able to discuss it openly and willingly. It was an adjustment, for sure.

“How did you do it? Where were you? Did you cry? Did _she_ cry?” Elena fired at Eve with barely enough time to take a breath in between questions.

“Well, we were kind of at her old apartment?” Eve replied, making the statement an unintentional question.

“Where you stabbed her?” Elena asked in disbelief, “So romantic, babe. Really… Nice one.” she added sarcastically, before her expression changed, “I didn’t even know she owned it.”

“She doesn’t.” Eve muttered.

“Wait.” Elena held up a finger and Eve cringed a little.

“You didn’t…” Elena started and watched Eve’s reaction closely and then gasped, “Oh my God, you did! You broke into an apartment!”

“I didn’t break in!” Eve retorted immediately, “Oksana broke in. I was just… there.”

“You proposed whilst breaking into a Parisian apartment. That’s so cool.” Elena breathed, genuinely impressed.

“It wasn’t cool. It was terrifying.” Eve assured her.

“Imagine if someone had come home! That would have been hilarious.” Elena chuckled.

“Yeah… Imagine.” Eve replied slowly.

Elena didn’t need to know the whole story. She had only asked about the proposal part after all. Villanelle’s little impromptu acting exercise could remain a secret. And the stash of blood money under the sink. That could be kept on the down low as well. Though Elena would undoubtedly adore that story.

“Let me see that.” Elena requested, beckoning Eve towards her and holding her hand out for Eve’s.

Eve sighed and offered up her hand with the engagement ring on it for inspection. Elena caught hold of Eve’s hand and pulled it closer, bending low over it as though she was a professional jeweller inspecting the quality of the diamond. Eve looked about the room absently as Elena was carrying out her evaluation.

“Phew!” Elena let out; almost more whistle than word, “That is a nice bit of bling. She chose well.”

“Hey!” Eve exclaimed, wrenching her hand free. “How do you know I didn’t choose the rings?”

Elena threw her head back and laughed heartily.

“Oh babe,” She said through her laughter, schooling her face into a look of patronising sympathy. “Babe, no. Your taste in jewellery is fucking awful.”

Eve sighed in frustration and placed her hand on her lap, out of Elena’s view.

  

 

It was an evening about two weeks after the proposal and Eve was stretched out on the sofa watching some incoherent crime drama on the TV. Villanelle was curled into her side, her head resting on Eve’s chest and her knees drooping over Eve’s legs so that her feet were hanging over the side of the sofa. Given their height difference, this was not the most comfortable position, but sometimes Villanelle seemed to favour it.  
  
Eve was absentmindedly drawing patterns on Villanelle’s back through her sweater whilst Villanelle pointed out all the mistakes that the on-screen killer was making. After a while, her comments tapered off, and for almost ten minutes Eve assumed that Villanelle had fallen asleep.

“When did you know?” Villanelle asked suddenly.

Not asleep then, Eve decided.

“Know what?” Eve murmured, shifting her shoulders slightly against the cushion behind her.

“That you loved me.” Villanelle explained.

Villanelle often liked to hear about Eve’s love for her. Some might say it was part of Villanelle’s inflated ego, but Eve had a suspicion that it was more closely related to her lurking insecurities. It wasn’t as though Villanelle wasn’t equally as vocal about her own love for Eve.

“Oh. Well… I suppose a few weeks after you moved in? When I stopped thinking you might murder me in my sleep probably.” Eve suggested, and Villanelle hummed thoughtfully.

“I knew you loved me before that. Want to know when?” Villanelle asked.

“Enlighten me.” Eve muttered, lifting her hand from Villanelle’s back and running it through her hair instead.

“When you stabbed me.” Villanelle said simply.

“What?” Eve laughed.

“Yes. That is when I knew.” Villanelle confirmed adamantly.

“Oksana, that’s insane.” Eve said flatly.

“Eve, I am not insane.” Villanelle replied quickly, lifting her head from Eve’s chest to look her in the eye.

“I know. I said _that_ is insane. Not you.” Eve reiterated.

Insanity remained a touchy subject for Villanelle and over the years Eve had begun to see why. Villanelle had been labelled a lot of times as a child and then as a teenager, and, whether they were true or not, those words left scars.

“OK.” Villanelle relented, and laid her head back on Eve’s chest. “Touch my hair again?”

Eve chuckled softly and resumed her stroking, feeling Villanelle sigh against her.

“You’ve never said that before,” Eve pointed out as Villanelle’s comment filtered through her mind, “You still don’t even like me touching the scar.”  
  
“Well, it didn’t feel _good_!” Villanelle exclaimed, “You stabbed me, Eve.” She added blankly.

Eve hummed in response. She wasn’t convinced of that particular moment being the catalyst for Villanelle realising Eve loved her, perhaps it was how Villanelle remedied it now but…

“You really didn’t know then?” Villanelle asked after a moment’s quiet.

“I think it made me realise that it was more than obsession,” Eve mused honestly, “And I probably _did_ love you then, but I didn’t know it yet, I guess.” And she felt Villanelle nod against her.

“It is good that you stabbed me then.” Villanelle said blankly.

“I… Wouldn’t put it quite like that.” Eve laughed.

Villanelle sat up and placed her feet on the ground, effectively trapping Eve’s legs beneath her own.

“Everybody knows you don’t hold a knife like that. It makes it too easy have it turned on you.” Villanelle said decisively.

“I was hardly thinking clearly!” Eve defended.

“Not you. This show. It’s stupid. You did a very good job, but this man,” she pointed at the television, “is a fool.”

Eve’s mind took a moment to process the abrupt change of direction in their conversation.

“It is a bit farfetched.” Eve agreed with a yawn.

“Yes. Let’s go to bed.” Villanelle decided and stood up before turning and holding her hand out to help pull Eve up.

“Tomorrow it will be only 51 days to wait.” Villanelle pointed out as she switched off the TV. And Eve smiled at Villanelle’s countdown. It was certainly a new feature to their evenings.

  

 

28 days had passed. Technically they could get married now. And yet there was still almost another month before their booking. Eve had no idea how people waited so patiently for this. She had gone from being reluctant to even entertain the idea of marriage again, to champing at the bit to sign on the dotted line. It had been nearly a year between her engagement to Niko and their subsequent wedding, and yet Eve couldn’t remember being this eager then.

Eve was at her desk, wishing she was at home, and the day was dragging. It was a Thursday, not that that made it any different to any other day at her desk. She had fired off an email to Elena requesting that they escape the building for lunch, and now Eve was simply watching the clock tick towards lunchtime. Sure, there was work she should be doing, and yet at this point Eve wasn’t even entirely sure what that work was. Something about organising a training course for Workplace Appropriate Behaviour. As if Eve should be the one organising that. She was engaged to the woman who had castrated her boss. That was hardly appropriate.

The phone on her desk rang, a light flashing on the handset that suggested an incoming call from an external number. So it wasn’t Elena calling to report more evidence of the affair she was convinced was going on between the maintenance guy and Julie from HR.

“Eve Polastri.” Eve said into the phone. That wouldn’t be her name for much longer, she realised for the Nth time in over a month.

“Ms Polastri! Glad I got hold of you. I tried your mobile but… you’re at work. Obviously. Good job you gave us your work number too. Imagine, me calling MI6, how fancy!” Came a slightly bumbling voice on the line in what sounded to Eve like an Irish accent.

“Um… Sorry, who is this?” Eve asked.

“Oh, right. Yes. This is Miriam Connell. From the Ealing Register Office.”

Eve’s breath caught.

“Ah, yes. Hello, Miriam.” Eve replied cautiously, trying to keep her excitement under wraps and maintain an air of professionalism. Clearly this woman thought MI6 was quite a big deal.

“Hello. Yes, we have a cancellation here. You said you wanted to be informed. It was a rather sudden one, I’m afraid. Cold feet, I suppose. It does happen, now and then. Better now than after the fact, I always say. Sure, sometimes it just isn’t meant to be, you know?” Miriam said happily before chuckling to herself.

“Uh… Yeah, I’m sure.” Eve said slowly, “And… the cancellation?” She enquired.

“Right. Yes. Of course. It’s at… 12.20. Any good?” Miriam asked.

“12.20…” Eve repeated out loud, glancing at the time in the corner of her computer screen. “That’s in an hour.”

“Mmm, yes. Rather sudden, like I said.” Miriam agreed.

“We’ll take it!” Eve rushed.

“You will? Grand. That is so good to hear, Ms Polastri, you know, when these things happen I just—”

“See you in an hour.” Eve said abruptly and hung up the phone. She allowed herself three deep breaths before picking up the receiver again and dialling a number she knew off by heart.

 

 

Villanelle was at the park. Feeding the ducks. Well, in theory Villanelle was feeding the ducks. It had been another slow work day and lately she had been finding it even more difficult to concentrate than usual. Another month. A whole other fucking month until she could be married to Eve. Why was it so fucking difficult? Surely they could just sign a form, change Eve’s name and then be married? What was the problem?  
  
She had tried to focus on her work. She had been trying for over a month already, and she still had basically another one to go. But every time she went to zoom in on a crime scene photo, her eyes caught on the ring on her finger, and then her mind caught on everything that it stood for.

She had someone who loved her unconditionally, someone who wanted her around, who _loved_ having her around, and not just because she was good at sex or good at murder, someone who loved having her around _just because_. It was a feeling that she had never thought she would have really. And it wasn’t just _anybody_ who loved her enough to want to actually be married to her; it was _Eve_. Eve, who was so warm and so smart and so funny, and had that amazing hair… Villanelle must have done something good at some point in her life to have deserved this. Maybe all those people she had killed were bad after all.

So, for today, Villanelle had given up on work. She hadn’t told anybody this, but they worked for British Intelligence, surely they could figure it out. And here Villanelle was, with a bag of stale bread she had swiped from the kitchen, on a bench at the park, in front of the duck pond. She had seen people do this before, had watched parents take their children to feed the ducks in every city she had ever lived in. As a child, she had watched this activity with envy, and as an adult she had strolled past with complete ambivalence.  
  
She had chucked a few pieces of bread for the ducks and watched as they flapped and bickered over the offering. One duck pecked harshly at the feathers of another and Villanelle decided that one was her favourite. Before long though, this became boring and Villanelle tried throwing bread at the ducks rather than for them, and that was more entertaining. She still had very good aim. Konstantin would be proud, she thought. And then a man on rollerblades had swooshed by on the path between Villanelle and the pond. Villanelle’s focus shifted immediately. With her first shot she managed to pelt him on the shoulder with a particularly stale piece of crust. It was an effort to convert her overjoyed bark of laughter into a coughing fit when the man twisted to see what had hit him and then tripped over his own feet and landed in a crumpled heap.

Villanelle hid her smirk behind the copy of _The Guardian_ she had picked up for Eve as she watched the rollerblader hobble to his feet and assess the bleeding graze on his shin. Perhaps this was a hot spot for men who thought that rollerblading was an appropriate mode of transport for adults. Villanelle could wait a while and find out. She still had lots of bread left.

There was a buzzing from the bench next to her and Villanelle glanced at her phone. It could only be Eve calling her. Very occasionally Konstantin would call, but he mostly dialled the landline at the house for some reason. Villanelle scooped up her phone. Eve was calling from work. Eve’s face filled the screen. It was one of the few selfies Eve had sent to Villanelle after much nagging, it was a terrible shot, the angles were all wrong, and Villanelle loved it.

“Hello baby.” Villanelle said into the phone, as the rollerblader sat down on the concrete once more and began pulling off his rollerblades gingerly and poking at his ankle.

“Oksana,” came Eve’s rushed voice. “Are you busy right now?”

Villanelle looked down at the bag of bread in her lap and then surveyed the extent of the path in front of her. No more unsuspecting rollerbladers in sight.

“Not really.” Villanelle replied.

“Good. There’s been a cancellation. Meet me at the registry office as quickly as you can.” Eve said hurriedly, but with an audible smile in her voice.

Villanelle felt her heart leap in her chest before it started pumping undiluted joy into her veins.

“OK, baby.” She replied quickly before hanging up.

Villanelle stood up abruptly and walked to the edge of the duck pond, dumping the entire contents of the bread bag directly into the water before striding away towards the exit of the park. Behind her erupted a cacophony of quacks and a whirlwind of feathers.


	10. Sherbet Lemons and Cheap Vodka

The Ealing Register Office was also the town hall. It was quite a grand looking building and Eve could imagine that those who carried out their actual wedding here would probably take quite nice photos on the stone steps to the entrance. Eve also surmised that there were likely decades upon decades of almost identical looking photos of that kind, with only the faces of the couple and the style of the dresses changing. She was, yet again, relieved that Villanelle had shown no interest in the whole white wedding fiasco.

Eve was waiting impatiently at the bottom of the steps by the time she caught sight of Villanelle strolling around the corner forty minutes after she had spoken to her on the phone. Immediately, Eve was struck by just how beautiful Villanelle truly was. It wasn’t as though Eve wasn’t constantly aware of that fact, but every now and then in their relationship it hit her again at full force. And this was one of those moments. There was just something effortless about the way Villanelle moved and possessed whatever space she was in. Even walking down the street, Eve could see the effect Villanelle was having on the people she passed. More often than not, heads turned and Eve could totally relate. But, unlike the gang of teenagers blasting music from a phone outside the newsagents opposite, (one of whom elbowed another and nodded appreciatively at Villanelle’s retreating form,) Eve was about to marry that woman.  
  
And that was insane. Five years ago, Villanelle was some sort of mythical creature to Eve. An assassin so skilled and elusive, she may as well have been confined to the pages of a crime novel. She popped up unannounced all over Europe to carry out grisly yet expert kills and then evaporated once more into the mist. She had saturated Eve’s mind, created a yearning and a magnetic pull towards her and the ties between them had got tighter and tighter until… And now, Eve had not only tracked down that shadowy figure and shone a lamp onto the reality of her, but she was marrying her. Was it that which was insane? Eve wondered. Or was it how right that fact felt?  
  
“OK baby?” Villanelle asked as she reached Eve and planted a greeting kiss on her lips.

From across the road, Eve heard a wolf whistle and the clatter of teenage boys shoving each other and whooping.

“Oksana,” Eve said in relief, “Hi. Yes. All good. Are you OK?”

Villanelle furrowed her eyebrows.

“Of course.” She shrugged, as though she was surprised Eve was even asking. “So we can do this now?” She added with thinly veiled excitement.

Eve nodded and inhaled deeply to steel herself.

“We can. If you’re ready. I know it’s sooner than we thought. But I asked them to tell me if anyone cancelled, and someone cancelled.” Eve explained, the words gushing out of her.

“I was ready months ago.” Villanelle said simply. And Eve knew that was true. It was Eve who had caused the hold up. Well, Eve and then typical British bureaucracy.   
  
“OK.” Eve nodded again and Villanelle narrowed her eyes at her.

“OK…” Villanelle drawled. “Are you… Do you want to do this, Eve? Are you scared?”

“No!” Eve barked out, louder and more insistently than she had been expecting. Villanelle pulled a face of surrender and took a step backwards.

“OK, I believe you!” Villanelle replied with raised brows “But we are still standing out here in the street so…” She pointed out.

“Right. We are. We should…” Eve gestured over her shoulder and went to turn around but stopped as she felt Villanelle catch hold of her hand.

“I love you Eve Polastri. This will not be like last time.” Villanelle said with almost as much sincerity as Eve had ever heard her use. Eve felt her lips turning up in a smile. She wasn’t sure that she had quite voiced the depths of that fear to Villanelle. She didn’t remember explaining her worry of marriage making things boring. She didn’t feel like that now, but somewhere along the line Villanelle must have deciphered that past anxiety. Insight into Eve’s feelings was something that apparently Villanelle had learnt to cultivate over the years without Eve noticing.

“It never could be. Not with you, darling.” She said, with a squeeze to Villanelle’s hand and then she adopted a stern expression, “Let that be the last time you call me Eve Polastri.” She added and then turned towards the building entrance before stopping in her tracks once more.

“Oh, and I love you too.” Eve said with a smirk over her shoulder.

“Well that is a relief.” Villanelle replied, and her tone suggested sarcasm, but the beaming smile on her face gave away her true feelings that surfaced whenever Eve uttered those words in her direction.

 

 

Inside the Ealing Register Office was yet more sweeping staircases and imposing looking balconies. It was clear that this place was meant mostly for people who were ‘doing it properly’ and not just popping in to sign some legal marriage documents and change a name on their lunch break from the office.  
  
Eve led them into the main atrium of the building and looked around uncertainly for a moment or two, trying to assess where it was they were meant to present themselves and what exactly one was meant to say. “Hi, we’re here to get married”? Suddenly, she was very aware of her work attire and minimal make up.

“Ms Polastri?” A voice called from a door beneath one of the staircases.  
  
Eve span around to face the voice.

“Yes.” She said blankly. And then watched as a plump woman in her sixties ambled towards her with an outstretched hand.

“Miriam Connell,” the woman said with a wide, slightly flustered smile, “We spoke on the phone earlier.”

Eve had been right in her assessment that morning. That was definitely an Irish accent.

“Ah yes, Miriam, pleased to meet you. Thank-you so much for fitting us in.” Eve said graciously, giving Miriam’s hand a firm shake, as Villanelle hovered next to her shoulder and assessed the unassuming woman who was about to change her life.

“Sure, not at all. You seemed quite serious when you asked to be notified of any cancellations.” Miriam replied, still shaking Eve’s hand. “MI6!” She exclaimed, “I don’t think I’ve ever married a spy before.”

Villanelle’s eyes zeroed in on Miriam’s hand clasped around Eve’s.

“Oh, I’m not a—” Eve started, trying to wrangle her hand free of the handshake that was _still_ going on.

“Me neither.” Piped up Villanelle in response to Miriam’s comment. She was speaking  in Sophie Wilson’s voice and threw in an uncharacteristic chuckle and a wink in Eve’s direction.

Miriam laughed noisily and finally relented with the handshake to squint at a collection of notes on a clipboard that she had been holding to her side.

“And you must be… Sophie Wilson?” Miriam asked, still staring at her notes.

“That’s me,” Villanelle agreed and Miriam looked up at her, a startled look as she appraised Villanelle none too subtly.

“And what a gorgeous couple you are.” Miriam said at last.

Eve shifted her feet slightly and Villanelle nodded proudly.

“Grand. OK. It’s…” Miriam glanced at her wristwatch, “12.10. Are you ready?”

“Yes.” Villanelle said immediately.

“If you follow me down this corridor to… Oh. And you’ve got your witnesses? Where are your witnesses?” Miriam looked around the atrium wildly as if suddenly noticing something was missing.

“Witnesses?” Villanelle demanded.

“Fuck.” Eve gasped, and then glanced apologetically at Miriam. “Sorry.” She mumbled.

“Oh dear, oh dear.” Miriam said, looking genuinely fraught. “You need two witnesses for this. We can’t do it without two witnesses.”

Eve could feel Villanelle growing tense beside her and began to fear for Miriam vaguely.

“You can do it.” Villanelle replied nodding at Miriam, a hint of her own accent slipping through the cracks of Sophie Wilson’s façade. And Eve knew that definitely meant Villanelle was struggling to maintain her calm. She put a gentle hand on Villanelle’s forearm.

“Oh no, dear. Register office employees can’t act as witnesses. It has to be someone who doesn’t work here. Any legal citizen of the UK over the age of 16.” Miriam said as though she was repeating something from The Register Office Rulebook.

Villanelle clenched her teeth and twisted on the spot, glaring at the ceiling momentarily.

“You’ve got ten minutes…” Miriam pointed out, unhelpfully.

“It can be anyone?” Eve asked. Why had she not remembered this? Why had she not grabbed Elena on the way out of the office, or Tony the security guard, anybody, for fuck’s sake?

Fury was practically rolling off of Villanelle in pulsing waves.

“Any legal citizens of the UK over the age of 16.” Miriam repeated robotically.

“OK.” Eve let out. “We’ll be right back.” She said, already grabbing Villanelle by the elbow and steering her back towards the main door.

“Eve. What is the plan?” Villanelle asked grumpily in her own accent as Eve hurried them down the steps.

“You find someone. I’ll find someone. We get married.” Eve panted as they reached the bottom of the steps.

Villanelle looked unconvinced.  
  
“She said anyone, Oksana!” Eve exclaimed. “You’re charming. You can talk someone into watching us get married and then signing a bit of paper.”

“I can.” Villanelle agreed, “OK.” She added, enthusiasm back in action, “See you in five minutes. And then we are getting married.”

With that, Villanelle span on the spot and stalked hurriedly down the street. Eve looked desperately around for someone, anyone, she could approach. Her eyes landed on the newsagent across the way. There was sure to be someone in there she could ask.

 

Eve bolted across the street, narrowly missing a cyclist and ignoring the curses yelled at her along with the screech of brakes.

Outside the shop, the huddle of teenagers remained. Eve strode past them and her hand was on the handle of the shop door when one of them called out to her.

“Hey, lady!”

Eve ignored him.

“Buy us some booze, lady!” He called.

“Your girlfriend is well fit.” Said another voice, and Eve rolled her eyes, pushing her way into the shop as she heard the first voice tell the second to shut up.

Inside the shop, Eve surveyed the three aisles quickly and found, to her dismay there was nobody there except the bored looking bloke behind the till. He could hardly leave his post and witness a marriage at 12.20 in the afternoon on a Thursday.  Eve groaned and turned to leave the shop.

The minute she was outside she was met with the teenage boys once more.

“Go on, buy us some booze. We’ve got the money.”

Eve sighed.

“How old are you? Why aren’t you in school?” She asked distractedly as she looked up and down the frustratingly empty street. She hoped Villanelle was having better luck.

“17.” Said the voice.

“You should be in school.” Eve replied and then stopped. “17?” she asked, finally looking at the boy who had been addressing her.

“Yeah, so?” He asked defensively, “Bet you drank before you was 18.”

He wasn’t wrong, Eve reasoned. God, was she really about to do this? Jesus. Yeah, she was. Desperate times called for less than legal measures. Plus, if Eve didn’t buy the booze for them, they would only get it elsewhere. Probably.

“I’ll buy your booze.” She agreed.

“Sweet!” The boy let out, looking at his mates smugly.

“ _If_ you do me a favour.” Eve added firmly.

“What do I have to do?” The boy asked suspiciously.

“Witness my marriage.” Eve said simply.

There was a cluster of muttering and a few laughs from the group of teens.

“To that woman? She’s fucking hot.” Said one of the other boys.

“She is.” Eve granted, because, why the fuck not? “So?” she asked the first boy impatiently, “Do we have a deal?”

He looked at his friends, for the first time seeming unsure of himself. His friends shrugged.

“Yeah. Fine. But buy the booze first.” He said sullenly.

“No time for that, I’ll buy it after.” Eve replied, already heading back towards the register office.

“You better.” Said the boy, trailing after her and scuffing his trainers on the pavement.

“What’s your name?” Eve asked, as she waited for a gap in the traffic.

“Ryan.” Said Ryan.

“I hope you’ve been practicing your signature, Ryan.” Eve chuckled as she spotted her chance and shoved Ryan in front of her across the road and towards the steps to the register office. There was no sign of Villanelle.

 

 

After Eve had relayed her plan to Villanelle, Villanelle had set off on her mission. She could do this. This would be easy. She was trained to get close enough to kill people. This was no different. Except she wouldn’t get to kill this person at the end of it. She would get to be married to Eve though, and that was incentive enough.

Less than hour ago, Villanelle had been at the duck pond. She had, of course, been eagerly awaiting the day herself and Eve would be at the registry office together, but she hadn’t expected it to be today. This was feeling rather chaotic now. And Villanelle could cope with chaos; she could find exhilaration in it even, if she were the instigator, if she had control of it. This lack of control was unsettling. And walking down the street, hunting for witnesses, this felt like an out of body experience to Villanelle. She had to keep her eyes on the prize now. At the end of this, she would be married to Eve. That was what mattered. Eve was all that mattered, and that had been true for a long time now. She could do this.

And yet, where the fuck was everybody? This was London. It should be heaving with people. But it was also Ealing. At 12.10 on a Thursday. And the streets were distinctly lacking in pedestrians. Villanelle marched along the pavement, her eyes wild and twitching this way and that looking for someone, anyone, who could get her what she wanted. Then her eyes landed on a bus stop, and more specifically the bench at a bus stop where an elderly lady was seated. She was wrapped up in a coat, far warmer than the mild weather of this particular Thursday called for, and she was studying some kind of book.

Villanelle’s shoulders relaxed and she slowed her pace to a serene walk as she approached the bench and sat down next to the elderly lady. Eve was right, this was something Villanelle was good at. From the corner of her eye, Villanelle could get a better look at the book in the lady’s wrinkled hands. It was a crossword book.

Villanelle sighed loudly. And looked around exaggeratedly at the automated bus timetable before sighing again. This might even be fun.

“It’s always late, isn’t it?” Villanelle remarked conversationally in Sophie Wilson’s voice.

“What’s that, love?” The elderly woman replied.

“The bus.” Villanelle said more loudly, “It’s always late.”

“Or you young people are just impatient.” The elderly lady gave a rattling laugh. “The busses were once a day when I was your age, if they came at all.”

Villanelle fought the urge to roll her eyes.

“At least you have something to do,” Villanelle said, keeping the conversation going, “I love crosswords.” She lied. She had never done a crossword in her life.

“Do you?” The lady asked, “Maybe you can help me with nine down then.” She said, and handed the folded book to Villanelle before leaning in closer to her.

She was breathing raspingly and Villanelle used her willpower not to shift away from her.

“Nine down…” Villanelle murmured, “Ah yes, ‘A note from a holiday,’ eight letters…”

This lady must be an idiot, Villanelle decided. This crossword was easy.

“Hmm…” Villanelle hummed, “It is a tricky one.”

“It is, it is.” The elderly lady agreed. “Would you like a sweet?” And she stuck her hand into her pocket, rustled around for a moment before producing two wrapped sherbet lemons.

“Ooh lovely,” said Villanelle, as a sweet was placed into her opened palm by a shaking hand. “My grandmother used to give me these.” Villanelle said wistfully. Another lie.

“Your grandmother must have been lucky to have you. You’re a sweet girl.” The lady pointed out as she struggled to unwrap her own sweet.

Villanelle took the sweet from the lady’s fingers and finished the job for her before passing the unwrapped sweet back.  The lady popped the sweet into her mouth.

“Oh!” Villanelle let out, “I think it’s Postcard!”

“Hmm?” The lady murmured, leaning back into Villanelle and looking down at her crossword book again. “Oh yes! Such a bright girl you are…” she waited for Villanelle to supply her name.

“Sophie.” Villanelle offered.

“Sophie. My daughter’s name too.” The lady said warmly. And Villanelle smothered a victorious smile. This just got even easier.

“And what is your name?” Villanelle enquired politely.

“Ethel.” Came the response.

“I wonder, Ethel,” Villanelle started, painfully aware of the minutes that had ticked away whilst she won this old bag over, “Are you going anywhere in a hurry?”  
  
“Well, I wanted to be home for _Countdown_.” Ethel replied cautiously. “That’s on at four, I think.”

“Oh, this won’t take that long.” Villanelle promised with an earnest smile.

 

 

Back outside the registry office, Eve was growing more and more impatient while Ryan repeatedly kicked the bottom step next to her. Each dull thud of his trainer-clad foot on the stone step was forcing Eve’s blood pressure upwards.

“How long is this going to take?” Ryan asked.

“Not long as soon as Oks—as soon as Sophie gets here.” Eve replied absently, craning her neck to see down the street.

And finally, there was Villanelle, walking along at a glacial pace with her arm around the shoulder of a small, hunched figure.

Eve could have jumped for joy. And then she assessed the speed at which Villanelle was moving and raised her wrist exaggeratedly as though she was checking her the time. She watched as Villanelle lifted the arm that wasn’t guiding the elderly woman in an apologetic shrug and then pointed at the woman and let her head drop forward as though she had fallen asleep.

Ryan scoffed beside her.

“She’s funny as well.” He pointed out.

“Hilarious.” Eve replied sarcastically.

Eventually Villanelle and the old woman reached Eve and Ryan.

Villanelle widened her eyes at Eve in silent despair at the amount of time that the short walk had taken.

“Eve,” Villanelle then said in her most polite voice, “This is my friend Ethel, she has generously offered to help us with our little dilemma.” Then she raised her voice a bit, “And Ethel, this is Eve, my partner.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Ethel.” Eve replied, matching her volume to Villanelle’s.

“Oh yes, yes.” Ethel replied, “What a world we live in now. Women marrying women. You know, when I was about 23, my friend Josie and I, we used to—”

“OK Ethel,” Villanelle practically shouted, “Here we are, let’s get started on these steps, shall we?”

Eve rushed forward and took Ethel’s other arm, so that herself and Villanelle were either side of unsteady woman.

“Who are you?” Villanelle asked Ryan lowly as she finally seemed to notice the teenager next to her. She glared at the teen and he seemed to grow suddenly uncomfortable in his skin.

Ryan cleared his throat.

“Ryan.” He answered, his voice cracking into a reedy screech mid-word.

Eve swallowed a laugh.

“Ryan and I have a deal, right Ryan?” Eve called from the other side of Ethel.

Villanelle shot an even more intense glare at Ryan.

“What kind of deal?” She growled suspiciously.

“She’s going to buy me booze!” Ryan squeaked innocently.

“Oh.” Villanelle said taken aback, “OK then.” She shrugged.

 

  

Inside the building, Miriam was anxiously waiting. She leapt forward as she saw the unlikely foursome reach the top of the steps and enter the building.

“There you are, just in time!” She hurried. And then she surveyed the witnesses with a look of mild shock.

“Well,” Miriam started, “I suppose I did say anyone.” She muttered before raising her voice, “This way then, this way!”

Miriam bustled off down a corridor as the rest of the party followed her. Thankfully it wasn’t too far, as by this point, Eve and Villanelle found themselves practically carrying Ethel.

A door was held open by Miriam and everybody filed in. Villanelle deposited Ethel in the nearest chair and Ethel heaved a sigh as though she had just got home after a long journey.

Ryan hovered awkwardly in the doorway.

“Ryan.” Eve stated, “Sit.” She pointed to the char next to Ethel, who was rummaging in her pocket. Ryan obediently took a seat.

“Sherbet Lemon, Brian?” Ethel asked.  
  
Miriam ushered Eve and Villanelle towards two more seats, these ones directly in front of a broad desk, behind which Miriam dropped herself into a chair and began shuffling paperwork.

“You were just in the nick of time there, Ms Polastri. Most exciting. I expect you’re used to excitement though.” Miriam garbled.

“I’m no stranger to it.” Eve replied honestly.

Beside her, Villanelle reached out for Eve’s hand and pulled it into her own lap. Eve was surprised to find that there was almost imperceptible tremor in Villanelle’s hand, and Eve squeezed it tightly before rubbing her thumb comfortingly across the back of it.

“Right then. It’s quite straightforward from here, really.” Miriam said. “I will read through all this here for you, and then you both will sign at the bottom of the licence.” She explained with a pleased smile.

“And then we are married?” Villanelle clarified.

“Well, your witnesses need to sign too, as they have listened to the terms and conditions and witnessed the both of yous doing so too.” Miriam added.

“And then we are married.” Villanelle repeated.

“And then you’re married.” Miriam confirmed. “Ready?”

“Yes.” Replied Eve and Villanelle simultaneously.

Miriam laughed and then began reading what Villanelle was sure was the longest and most boring form she had ever heard. All about how neither of them knew of any reason why they couldn’t married, that neither of them were already married and blah, blah, blah. Villanelle began by trying to pay attention and then lost focus when she reminded herself that in a matter of minutes, she would be married to Eve.

Villanelle was still ruminating contentedly on that thought when she heard Miriam pause before speaking again.

“If all of that seems grand with you both, then it’s time for you to sign. Who’s first?” She said, offering a fountain pen between Eve and Villanelle.

Villanelle snatched the pen immediately.

“She’s certainly eager, Ms Polastri.” Miriam laughed to Eve, who smiled in return and watched as Villanelle paused momentarily before signing. To anyone else, that pause may have seemed like a moment to gather herself before putting her name to such a life-changing piece of paper. Eve, however, knew that Villanelle was merely remembering the right signature for the name she was using.

“Here you go, baby.” Villanelle said, passing the pen to Eve.

“Oh, one moment.” Miriam cut in, “I’m afraid this only works if both your witnesses are… you know… awake.”

Eve and Villanelle turned around to see Ryan poke gently at Ethel’s arm. Ethel merely let out a snore, her head drooping forward on her chest.

“ETHEL!” Villanelle shouted and clapped her hands twice.

Ethel jolted forward and her eyes shot open. Villanelle turned back to Miriam, ignoring Eve’s shaking head and Ryan’s stifled sniggering.

“OK. She’s up.” Villanelle said.

“Oh right. Um… Over to you then, Ms Polastri.” Miriam said, her eyes lingering on Villanelle for a moment.

Eve took the pen from Villanelle and signed the paper next to where Villanelle had scrawled Sophie Wilson’s elaborate and loopy signature. She placed the pen back on the table.

“It’s done?” Villanelle asked on a loaded exhale.

“In a moment, Ms Wilson. We’ll just get your witnesses there to sign their bits.” Miriam replied.

Ryan shuffled over immediately and Eve passed him the pen, pointing her finger to where he is meant to sign and watching him look in bewilderment at the fountain pen before scratching his full name into the paper.

Miriam watched his penmanship with a grimace that would have made Eve laugh if she hadn’t been so impatient for this to be successfully completed at last.

“Thank-you, Ryan.” Eve murmured.

“Vodka, yeah?” Ryan replied under his breath and Villanelle scoffed. Miriam perhaps chose not to hear that exchange.

“Ethel!” Villanelle called again before pacing over to where the elderly woman was once again perusing her crossword book.

“Oh good,” Ethel said as Villanelle stopped in front of her, “Seven across is a devil.” She explained.

“I will look at it in a moment, OK? Just come and sign this form quickly for me, will you?” Villanelle asked, her police voice back in action.

“Oh yes, love. Of course.” Ethel replied.

Villanelle helped the woman from her seat and over to the desk where she plucked a pair of exceedingly thick glasses from her coat pocket and proceeded to peer at the form in front of her.

“What does it say, dear?” Ethel asked Villanelle.

“It’s what she just read out.” Villanelle nodded at Miriam, “Just sign it here.” She said with just the smallest morsel of impatience leaking into her voice.

“Right you are.” Ethel agreed and, with a shaking hand, she added her name to the form.

There was finally silence in the room for a moment as Ethel signed and then handed the pen back to Villanelle.

“Thank-you, Ethel.” Villanelle sing-songed.

“Of course, dear.” Ethel said, placing her hand over the back of Villanelle’s and giving it a shake before turning to Eve, “Such a sweet girl.” She smiled.

“The sweetest,” Eve agreed with a wide smile up at Villanelle that looked perfectly sincere to everybody else in the room. Only Villanelle knew that Eve was holding back laughter. It wasn’t often that someone with a kill list as long as Villanelle’s was described as ‘sweet’.

“Well, then,” Miriam cut in and then adopted a deep and mocking voice in a grave tone, “With the power vested in me by… Ealing Town Hall… I now pronounce you, well, wife and wife.” She finished with a laugh. “You may kiss the… Oh, OK.”

Miriam had only made it part way through her final sentence before Villanelle had hauled Eve to her feet by gripping her under the elbows and landed a desperate kiss on her lips. Eve was caught between laughing and returning the gesture before giving up on the laughter and just allowing herself to feel the relief in Villanelle’s kiss.

“Nice.” Muttered Ryan, under his breath.

“Are you any good at crosswords, dear?” Ethel asked, entirely oblivious to the display of affection to her side and addressing Miriam across the table.

 

  

Eve had had to persuade Villanelle with whispered assurances that they would celebrate their marriage properly when they got home if she would just take Ethel outside and call her a taxi. Eventually Villanelle agreed, and even begrudgingly filled in three more crossword clues before the taxi arrived. Villanelle overpaid the driver, gave Ethel an empty promise to visit her for tea, and then heaved a thankful groan as the taxi finally pulled away.

Meanwhile, Eve had picked up forms to change her name officially to Wilson and had led Ryan back across the street to his friends who were exactly as they had left them.

“So, you want vodka?” Eve asked reluctantly.

“Yeah. The biggest bottle he’s got.” Ryan agreed. “Oi, give her the cash.” He added to one of the other teenagers.

“It’s on me.” Eve threw over her shoulder as she headed into the shop, the word, “sick” greeting her ears as she left. She would go ahead and assume that was a good word in this context.

Eve smirked to herself as she chose the most Russian looking bottle from the selection of off-brand vodka behind the counter and paid for it. When she got back outside, half expecting, perhaps misguidedly, a chorus of thanks from the teens, she was met with a distracted group who weren’t even looking her way. Instead the gang’s focus was on Villanelle, who was now striding across the road.

“She is fucking fit though.” Eve heard one of them say.

“Oi Ryan, did they kiss?” Said another.

At that point, Eve cleared her throat and the group’s attention turned to her.

“Here you go, Ryan.” Eve said, handing over the bottle, “Thank-you for your time today.”

“Yeah, uh, no worries. Mrs Wilson.” Ryan muttered, taking the bottle and nodding awkwardly.

“OK baby?” Villanelle asked, as she reached the group.

Silence fell among the group.

“Yeah, Did you get Ethel sorted alright?” Eve questioned carefully.

“Ugh. She takes forever to do anything.” Villanelle said with an exaggerated eye roll.

Villanelle ignored the teenagers who were all subtly and not so subtly checking her out, and grabbed Eve’s hand.

“We are going home right now.” Villanelle said loadedly as she pulled Eve away.

“Thanks again, Ryan.” Eve called as she allowed Villanelle to steer them down the street. “And go to school!” She added. 

Villanelle glanced over her shoulder as though she had only just noticed the teenagers.

“Bye Ryan,” she called with a wink that caused Eve to elbow her in the side.

Behind them there was suddenly an explosion of chatter and catcalls directed at Ryan.

“That was cruel.” Eve murmured. And Villanelle just shrugged.

 

 

 Eve and Villanelle returned home. There was no way in hell that Eve was going back to the office this afternoon, and Villanelle had already given herself the day off before knowing anything about their marriage appointment.

They arrived back at the house and Villanelle let them in with her keys before Eve closed the door behind them. There was an odd feeling in the air, a kind of suspension of time. They were married. And it was surreal.

Villanelle turned around in the hallway and looked at Eve who had leaned her back against the front door after closing it. For a moment or two they simply studied each other. And then Villanelle took a step closer and opened her arms.

Eve stepped into Villanelle’s space and looped her arms around her waist. She felt Villanelle wrap her own arms around Eve’s shoulders and pull her in tight before resting her cheek against the top of Eve’s head and letting out a sigh.

“Are you happy, Eve?” Villanelle asked, and Eve could feel her jaw move against her hair as she spoke.

Eve nodded, her face hidden in Villanelle’s soft sweater. Cashmere probably, she thought absently.

“Yes?” Villanelle pushed.

Eve pulled her head back and peered up at Villanelle who was looking down at her questioningly, the barest hint of nerves in her face.

“Oksana,” Eve said seriously, “I am the happiest I have ever been.”

A smile spread across Villanelle lips that slowly opened to reveal her teeth.

“That is good, baby.” Villanelle said through her smile, “I am as well.”

Eve stretched up to place a kiss on Villanelle’s lips and felt her respond slowly at first, then more hungrily and Eve was happy to match her pace. Eve nudged Villanelle with her hips and began backing her towards the stairs until the heels of Villanelle’s boots hit the bottom step sooner than either of them had been expected and their kiss broke as Villanelle fell backwards into an awkward sitting position on the stairs. Eve laughed warmly and climbed into Villanelle’s lap as Villanelle’s hands landed immediately on her hips to steady her. Eve stroked the side of Villanelle’s neck and gazed down at her.

“Does it feel any different to be married?” Eve asked in a whisper.   
  
She already knew the answer as far as her own feelings were concerned. It definitely felt different.

“Better.” Villanelle said at once, “It feels better.”

 

  

It wasn’t until much later that evening that Eve had cause to look at her phone. The couple had eventually made their way haltingly up the stairs and into the bedroom where they had been for the remainder of the afternoon and into the evening.

The bedroom was now mostly dark and when Eve awoke a little disorientated and looked to her side, Villanelle was sleeping serenely. In the light from the streetlamp outside the window there was a glint on one of Villanelle’s fingers where her engagement ring had now been joined by a wedding band. Eve felt a pulse of happiness spread through her at the sight.

Villanelle had remembered the wedding rings somewhere between their second and third bout of celebration and had skidded, entirely nude, from the bedroom and down the stairs. As it turned out, Villanelle had made a pit stop at the house once she left the park earlier that day and picked up the rings. She had then, amid the chaos, forgotten that they were in her pocket.

Eve shuffled up into a seated position in the bed, holding the sheets about her to ward off the chill. She looked down at the identical rings on her own finger and smiled to herself before turning her eyes on the woman next to her once more. Eve longed to lean over and touch Villanelle, to stroke her fingers across the smooth skin of her bare back but Villanelle was clearly deeply asleep and Eve didn’t want to wake her just yet.

Eve could occupy herself for a while. And that is what led her to quietly snatching her phone from the bedside table and squinting into its blue light. She was surprised to find a barrage of calls and messages from Elena, though she supposed later that she probably shouldn’t have been. Eve opened WhatsApp, curious to see what Elena had been so urgently contacting her for.

 

**‘Still on for lunch, yeah?’ – 11.50**

 

**‘Babe, we should go to that sushi place again.’ – 11.52**

**‘Eve, I’m in the lobby.’ – 12.40**

**‘Hurry up, the security guy is talking to me.’ – 12.46**

**‘Ugh. I guess lunch is off then.’ – 13.23**

**‘Eve, where are you?’ – 15.17**

 

Eve felt guilty. She had totally forgotten about lunch with Elena. Her morning at work seemed decades ago now. The memory of sitting, bored at her desk before Miriam had called now seemed like it happened on a different planet. Eve fired off a message to Elena, deciding to get the awkward chat out of the way early this time, without having to explain in person and face Elena’s teasing. Elena would have a field day when she heard about Ryan and Ethel.

 

**‘Elena, I’m so sorry I missed lunch. I sort of got married instead.’ – 21.07**

 

Eve braced herself for the response to that. And she didn’t have to wait long.

 

**‘EVE!’ – 21.09**

**‘WHAT THE FUCK???’ – 21.09**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's a wrap, chaps. Thank-you, as ever, for your thoughts and comments along the way. I appreciate them greatly!


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